SKY QUEEN

Andrew Hall

© Andrew Hall 2016

Find me on Twitter at @andrew_in_space.

Cover art by Gerry Arthur

All rights reserved. No reproduction without permission.

This novel is a work of fiction. All names, characters, businesses, organisations, places and events are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

1

In a ruined office, in the ashes of his world, a blond man stared at pigeon guts. There just weren’t enough people left to eat these days; it was a shame. He swallowed one last sliver of its slick raw flesh, and wiped his bloody chin with a coat sleeve. Chair creaking, Alex sat back from a rain-warped desk by blown-out windows. Steady breaths in the desolate silence. Birdsong, and the dry stony smell of urban ruins. He watched the feathers wind-tumble by a dead computer, as blowing brickdust peppered the gore. Looking out at the New York wasteland, from the forty-second floor.

Someone had lived half their life at this desk, he supposed. Back in the old world. Beside the grimy toys and a weather-worn planner, pens and pencils still stood neat and cobwebbed in their pot. He glanced at unknown family photos in dusty old frames, and a coffee cup hand-painted by a kid. Alex felt his own heartbreak at the sight of it. He had to turn away in his seat.

He hated not being hungry. It let the thoughts back in. The stinging memories of them. The grief and the guilt. Sunny snapshots of family vacations, and young laughter and pool fights, running endlessly through his head. Maddening. Everyone was gone. He sat and stared at the apocalypse, lost in thought. Grey clouds crawled over the city’s skyline skeleton.

How many weeks now, he wondered, since it all came down?

At first there’d been nothing but terror. Swarming silver spiders, and that crawling black ship. The city on fire. Then came the sickness, and surviving on bodies; it was all he could stomach once he’d changed. Those frightened survivors had caught him, the cannibal, and thrown him from a tower block window when he lashed out rabid. Falling forever.

He’d come around screaming on the street. Something in him refused to die. He wasn’t even whole, where he’d hit that rubbled sidewalk; he left parts behind in his silver blood. He crawled. Wild eyes staring, growling frothed spit through cracked lips and gritted teeth, he’d dragged himself away from Death. Nothing heroic; more a mad-dog streak. The way bleeding wild animals just kept on living.

He’d crawled eternally, for that great dead monster in the road. Its flesh and blood; its strength. Devouring it. Piecing himself together with its gripping black skin. Its life was a virus; spawning new muscles and twining his spine. His scaled new body limped him away from that place, as his fear and panic turned to fierce hunger and burning black hate. It grew in him, like someone else. Wrapped his brain and kept him alive. All he was, all he’d felt... nothing but firewood to that strange dark furnace. People were just sacrifices to a strong new something, that wasn’t entirely him. The families and wanderers, and the redhead who got away. All just vessels now, for things he needed. Just breathing, talking, meat.

Nothing mattered any more. Life was violence. Violence kept him alive. He’d do whatever it took to grow stronger than these invaders, and make them bleed, and take back New York for his family. No matter the horror. No matter the cost. The only fight left was revenge.

‘...My ass is numb,’ Alex mumbled to no one, standing up from the weathered office chair to stretch. He grunted and yawned, and reached for the ceiling tiles with cold dark hands. Sometimes he still felt the warm bleeding weight of his brother, dying in his arms, on that first day. When he searched derelict homes he still saw his parents, and his little sister; the slumped grey husks that the spiders made of them. He didn’t go into homes any more. It hurt too much. It was just the haunted city now. The dead stores and ruined skyscrapers. Grey silent places, for the concrete ghosts of ambition. Something broke off his thoughts. Falling rubble, way down below.

They’re trying again, he thought, watching their strange shapes down on the road. They’ll never stop hunting me. They were pointing; running. They’d seen him. An artillery flash. Alex leapt from the blown window as the office exploded deafening behind him. He dropped from the tower; cracked the rippling asphalt with a thud where he landed on his feet. He sprinted for the alien soldiers and tore a slender figure limb from limb, in a screaming burst of golden blood. Roared as he punched another Watcher to the sidewalk and wrenched its skull with a savage snap. He dodged screeching shots of light. Watching the tall dark soldiers gaining on him, he scrambled away for cover in the ruins. Still just a wild animal, running from the hunt. Beyond the rubble of toppled buildings, an alien army spread through the corpse of New York to find him. Kill him. The anomaly.

Running Watchers planted living barriers in the roads, swelling and branching into tall ribbed barricades. Unearthly soldiers rushed up the growing ramparts to lock scaly cannons in place. White-eyed helmets like statue heads scoured the dead streets for any sign of him. Heaving black monsters galloped up the road ahead like oil-spill primates, ripping the rubble apart to sniff hungrily for his scent.

Alex hid away in a ruined tower block. Gulped hot gold blood from a torn alien limb, and felt its slick surge set his veins on fire. He waited in the shadows for the cautious soldiers to stalk through the dead traffic below, wandering into his trap. Leaping from a high window, he threw his voltage into the cars beneath him. The street exploded in deafening hellfire, flaring orange in the dead grey world. Thick black smokeclouds rolled up into the sky; concrete pebbles rained down and clattered in the fresh dusty silence. Some of the Watchers had escaped; most were writhing and screaming and flailing for lost limbs between the burning wrecks. Cannons on the distant barricade screeched warping shots into the sky. Alex floated there above it all, grinning. He blew the barricade apart with a lightning bolt, sudden and blinding. Watchers were thrown down screaming and bleeding among their crackling corpses. Alex’s wild stark eyes drank in the dancing flames of New York. His New York.

‘How many times do we need to do this!?’ he yelled up at the creeping mothership, death-black and colossal. Crawling its vast whale-squid shadow over toppled city streets. The winter wind blew the ashes of humanity into high winding spirals over Manhattan. Flames danced a glowing zig-zag trail of destruction through entire city blocks; a dozen failed attempts to kill him. He’d tried over and over to bring the ship down too. But the thing ate every volt he threw at it. Just drank it through that rubbery black skin.

Alex sighed, descending a couple of streets away. Time for a new approach. He’d need something to hit the ship’s armour with; he looked around for something heavy. Glanced down the road at something moving there.

‘Hey!’ he shouted to a hulking black monster, stepping out into the street. Its white eyes fixed on him; heat hazed from its heaving blowtorch breath. With a crackling growl it came thumping and crashing up the road towards him. Snarling, Alex ran for it. He leapt and threw lightning as it pounced for him; a human volt bomb. The blast threw the monster back with a crackling crash. Alex pounced on the stunned creature in a flurry of sparks and smoke. Sank his claws in deep and ripped it apart screaming in a wild rage. For a few glorious moments he didn’t know where he was, or what was going on. That same quiet voice of reason nagged in the back of his mind. The rest of him strangled it into silence. All he knew in that moment was the spilling, slopping, steaming silver gush of violence that made his heart race; that kept him alive. He buried a clawed hand in the monster’s screaming head and pulled its brain apart. Shoved a slick gory fistful in his mouth and minced it; gulped it down and felt the silver-silk rush in his veins. He tore the thick spine from the creature’s back in a succession of squelching snaps, and walked out onto the road with it dragging and dripping in his hands. Watchers came running to open fire. A sweep of his hand electrocuted them in a blinding white thunderclap. Grinning savage as they dropped dead smoking. In a burst of light he shot into the sky to meet the mothership overhead. He landed with a bang that echoed through the city and swung the severed spine, smashing dents in the ship’s armoured scales.

‘How many times do I have to ask!?’ he roared at it, tearing holes in its metal skin. ‘I’d like to negotiate, please!’ A door melted open above him in the ship’s hull. Watchers peered down and opened fire.

‘Finally!’ Alex said happily. He pounced up into the doorway and butchered the screaming Watchers where they stood. Breaking limbs. Gouging heads. Strangled screams. As the gurgling corpses thumped down bloody, the survivor just stared at the smiling hybrid in fright. Didn’t even raise its gun.

‘Smart,’ Alex growled, with a black-fanged grin. Gulping gold blood from a severed head. He dropped it with a thump to lick the gore off his claws. ‘Now take me to your fucking leader.’

2

A night-black shape, scarred and primal, cut past cold distant stars. Scales darker than the lonely void around it. The creature’s hard white eyes watched infinity slide by. Behind them, an animal mind churned in silent space. Forgotten furies. Raptures long remembered. What it was, and what it was not. The creature’s engines rumbled on; glowing pale ghostfire. Sailing on into the abyss. Beneath its thick skin, in the cockpit around its heart, its human female lay in deathly sleep. Stone-still tentacles gripped the ceiling above her, dormant in the dark. The unmoving air, cold and glass-fragile, hung in silent hymn to the frozen shrine. Her clawed black hands and feet. Her body tucked and shielded, foetal-funereal. Blood-red curls. Eyelids twitching as she slept.

Tabitha stood on the pier with her mum. She was eight or nine, dressed warmly, with itchy scabs on both knees after falling from her bike days before. A salt-sharp sea breeze ruffled her frizzy ginger curls. The pier was deserted; it was just the two of them. Strangely mild for early winter. The stern iron stems of Victorian streetlights lined the faded boardwalk, elegant and decapitated. Looking out between rusted white railings, Tabitha saw the sea meld with the sky on the far horizon. One of those dusty pale dusks that felt like a dream, or an old painting half forgotten.

‘Are you alright love?’ her mum asked her softly.

‘Yeah,’ Tabitha replied, staring out at the still sea. ‘I miss Dad.’ She felt her mum’s hand squeeze hers; looked up and saw her sad smile. The early moon glowed high above like a pearl balloon. Lemon-yellow lights illuminated old hotels along the bay behind them. The smoky clouds past town were low and solid, like misted mountains in the far distance. The huge sky was powder-pale. Blue and purple and smoky orange like old bruises. Seagulls sang to the sea; a sad lost call. Her mum told her something important, but Tabitha couldn’t make it out. Her voice was a muffled hum. When she looked up again, her mum was a vague flickering form. A shivering ghost, vanishing into blowing dust. Lost against the sky beyond. She was alone.

‘Mum!’ Tabitha cried out. She sat up in Seven’s cockpit, wide-eyed, reaching out to nothing. The tears came too easily; that old shard of glass in her heart. She touched her hard black fingers to the silk ribbon on her wrist. Looking around, she realised she’d been woken by a growing light in the cockpit. The small plastic flower on the console began to dance. Pushing her thoughts back, Tabitha smiled at Fishbowl as it climbed down from the ceiling. It came to bob there beside her seat, gentle and patient as the tide.

‘Hi you,’ she said softly, running her black hands through its tapping tentacles. ‘Did you sleep ok? ...Feels like I’ve been sleeping for years.’ Yawning and stretching stiffly, she sighed and ran her hard palms over the bony console in front of her. She had to remind herself how the cockpit felt. There it was, that same static sensation she loved; the only sense of touch her hands had left.

Dipping into Seven’s mind, she felt his embrace that clouded out her dreams and sad memories.

Hi, she told him, with a warm smiling thought. Felt their minds swirl and mix in a white endless space. A safe warm place, bright as the dawn. She leant into his mind and saw with his eyes. Saw the endless black void around them, and the lonely stars forever distant. Felt her stomach twist. They were drawing near to their destination; the streaming stars whipping by began to slow. A new world grew closer in the darkness. At first it was little more than a bright dot; within minutes it’d grown to a shining orb in the black. Tabitha was transfixed. Soon she could make out the blue of alien oceans. An ozone halo crowned the new world. An alien sun burned gigantic in the void beyond. The silhouette of a second planet, millions of miles away, was nothing but a black spot on the sun’s surface. Tabitha’s throat felt dry; she gulped nervously at the sight. Closer now, and she could pick out the ragged edges of muddy black-brown continents. She felt butterflies; fear and hope in equal mix. Either way, she was eager to explore. As they drew closer though, and the vast planet filled their view, she saw the cracks. An endless web of glowing fractures spanned the primordial continents. Fiery faults spewed magma that would’ve wiped out nations, had there been any. Her heartcore sank at the sight.

Seven’s black scales glowed sharp neon orange as he entered the atmosphere. Dropping from the dark starry blue, he shot through high white clouds that broke suddenly, revealing the world below. Seeing through his vision, Tabitha looked over the landscape from the cockpit as they headed lower. She put a hand to her mouth in silent shock. Her stark yellow eyes, wide and darting, took in the fullness of this new place. But this wasn’t their new home. This was hell.

Tabitha stepped down from Seven’s wing onto hard black rock; not a blade of grass in sight. Volcanoes burst and spewed fire in the distant hills, filling the dark grey sky with a hades growl. Gagging on the stench of sulphur, she pulled up her catsuit hood to wrap her face and harden into a breather helmet. The air was a stale wall, an oven heat pressing in around her. She stooped to pick up a sharp black pebble; a chunky jagged remnant of some ancient lava flow. Crushing the stone was hard, even with the strength in her metal hands. Opening up her palm, she watched the stone’s grey dust peel and blow on the hot rancid wind. On the shore behind them, bright blue waves lapped on dead grey sand. Something slithered from the rushing surf and bared its teeth; some vile proto-serpent with a mouthful of fangs. Its blind head sought her as it slithered up the beach. Another crawled from the waves, and another behind it. Suddenly the beach was alive with them, slithering piranha-pythons, pale as dead limbs. Massing like worms as they followed her fleshy scent. Scaled skin whispering through the dark sand, leathery-white and dotted with cold black grit. Seven watched them coming closer. He growled and swept Tabitha gently behind him with a wing, putting himself between her and the snarling tangle. White fire grew in his throat as he rumbled his dominance.

‘No, Seven,’ Tabitha told him sadly, climbing back up his wing. ‘There’s no need. We’re leaving.’ Seven’s harness grew around her waist and shoulders as she took the saddle; she patted his neck to stop his growling. With a thought she nudged him up into the air, and left the slithering creatures snarling hungrily below.

She sighed as they soared over endless miles of scorched wasteland. There was nothing here but black rock and magma supernovas; deep chasms in the planet’s crust that glowed with a red hellish light. Whatever life they saw in the grey deserts was fierce, crude and clear-skinned; murder-bright broods that snarled and stared blind far below. The scarce plant life was red and twisted like spindly arteries, or slick pulsing fungus in sickly yellow against the black ground. Writhing things like fleshy starbursts wandered endless miles of lichen-covered rocks, grazing in silent shuffling swarms. If a plague could evolve to populate a planet, this was it.

‘We can’t stay here,’ she told Seven, giving up the search for grass and peace. Studying the hologram globe, the whole planet looked much the same. A fiery desolation, broken only by cold blue waves and pits of rabid reptilia. Vast plains of shivering fronds that filter-fed the smokebelch air. Tabitha sank into the cockpit and sealed out the choking sulphur sky. Pulled her helmet back into a shrinking hood and brushed at the yellow residue that powdered her black catsuit. She studied the hologram with a blank hopeless stare, and pulled it open to fill the cockpit with a shining map of the stars. Running a hand through Fishbowl’s waving arms, she sighed sadly as they raced up through the atmosphere. She could feel Seven’s frustration reflect her own. Already they were looking for another planet to try. Already, after such a long journey, they’d left a new world behind.

Black teeth grinned in the moonlit dark. A gliding blade, pushed in, soft as love. Tabitha’s heart burst and sparked like a dead star. She woke up screaming and looked around at the cockpit, gasping for sanctuary and the feel of her monsters. Alex’s face was still so clear; the blade so real. Scarier still were the feelings she could’ve had for him, once.

‘Fuck you,’ she sobbed quietly, hugging her knees to her chest in the pilot seat. Beyond the white flexing walls around her, Seven sailed on for distant stars in the lonely void.

3

On a distant world named Serenity, four figures sipped drinks in a sunlit garden. They were dressed finely in sentient fabric; seated around a gleaming stone table and enjoying the views from a striking stately home. Deciding, in secret, how to carve up the natural resources of a newly discovered planet. First though, they had to decide how to carve up the Arch Minister of their interworld government who opposed them.

‘Bomb,’ the large reptilian said simply, in his deep belching voice. Eyed them warily and scratched his red scaled jaw. He’d always struggled to wrap his vocal chords around the dull, stilted Trade Language of the Ministry worlds. Liked to keep its use to a minimum.

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ said a blue willowy creature in a sharp suit, amused at the primitive suggestion. She shook her head; sipped her cocktail. ‘There’s only one race who still bombs their enemies,’ she scoffed. ‘The Guardians would arrest you the same day. And, by extension, us. We’ve any number of droners who could do a much cleaner job.’

‘I still say smear and bankruptcy carry the least risk,’ said the third figure, quick-spoken; a diminutive six-limbed creature in a breathing helmet. His voice sounded thin and fuzzy through the mouthpiece. ‘Or, we can leave it to the specialists,’ he suggested, taking a hissing breath. ‘Rival parties. Drug lords. Very effective at disappearing people, even VIPs. I could arrange it now. No one would have the slightest suspicion we were ever involved.’

‘No! I will not disgrace my ancestors with these cowards’ plots!’ the large reptilian growled angrily, banging his huge hand on the stone table. ‘I will take a knife to the Arch Minister’s throat myself!’

‘Would you keep your voice down?’ the blue willowy figure cut in, glancing around cautiously at the empty sunkissed gardens. ‘You’ve already made yourself perfectly clear on that point.’

‘Repeatedly,’ the small creature sighed impatiently, tapping away hurriedly at the compact screen on his wrist.

‘You’re all missing the point,’ the fourth figure purred, leaning forward from the shadows. Stark and androgynous; winter made flesh. It held up its empty glass to a scurrying waiter in the distance. The other three listened intently; it was wise to. ‘There’s no need to dispose of the Arch Minister before we take his new territory,’ the winter figure said calmly, cold eyes flicking to everyone in turn. Its voice cut like a knife. ‘Let him keep this pristine, virgin world off-limits for as long as he likes. Use that to our advantage.’

‘Go on,’ the willowy figure replied, glancing at the others; sipping her drink.

‘The Arch Minister’s decreed that no contact be made with the planet, in case of unevolved intelligent life,’ the winter figure explained. ‘He’s decreed that the Guardian ships on course for the new world are merely to keep watch from orbit, with plenty of military hardware to scare away the prospectors. Meanwhile, we hire freelancers to stake our claim on the planet. There are far fewer eyes watching the frontier than in homespace.’

‘Freelancers?’ said the six-limbed creature. ‘Impossible. We’d never get mercenaries past those Guardian ships.’

‘I’m not talking about getting anyone past them,’ the winter figure replied, smiling graciously as the waiter strode over with a fresh glass of spirit. ‘Everyone has their price,’ it said softly. ‘Even the Guardians.’

‘You’ve lost your mind,’ the reptilian belched, chuckling into his glass as he gulped his drink.

‘Careful,’ the winter figure purred, fixing him with that icy stare. The reptile’s honour demanded that he keep eye contact... but his fear persuaded him to abandon the venture. He’d already heard just how ambitious the winter figure could be.

‘Buy out the government’s own peacekeepers to mine this new planet? Do you really think that would work?’ said the willowy creature.

‘For several times their current salaries? I’d like to think so,’ the winter figure replied with a smile. ‘I’ve found our fine upstanding Guardian troops policing the Outer Rim to be ambitious, enterprising and thoroughly corruptible. I have complete faith in them.’

The three figures around it at the table glanced at one another. Looking gradually more satisfied with the proposal, they relaxed in their seats one by one. The large reptilian was the last to agree, breathing out through his narrow flaring nostrils as he nodded his approval.

‘Well then. To mercs on the payroll,’ said the willowy creature happily, raising her glass with the rest.

‘To ambitious covert enterprise,’ the winter figure corrected her, with a subtle warning glance to the waiter listening in the distance. It clinked their glasses and smiled.

Blue-white batbirds fluttered up from the trees beside them in the gardens, and flocked out over the gleaming Ministry capital beyond. The super city that the winter figure had always wanted in its hand, ever since it’d raised itself from the slums and gutters. If the overworked, underpaid Guardian troops on the new frontier took its bribe, soon it’d have a small private army. And with all the raw natural resources of a new world under its control, it’d make sure that army didn’t stay small for long. If the four of them were going to carve up the incorruptible Arch Minister and take his throne, they’d do it on the winter figure’s terms. Quietly, carefully, one little knife cut at a time. And with the Arch Minister’s own galactic military, his almighty pride and joy, bought out beneath him with the spoils of his new forbidden world. Waiting in the shadows if he disagreed. A hundred million knives in the dark.

4

Tabitha woke from frozen sleep, felt her stomach lurch, and threw up water in the cockpit.

‘Oh god, I’m sorry,’ she mumbled, looking around stiffly for something to mop it up. Dipping into Seven’s mind though, his thoughts just glowed with some weird equivalent of laughter.

‘Well I’m glad you think it’s so funny,’ Tabitha said grumpily, wiping her mouth. Wincing and rubbing at her astro-migraine as she sat up in the seat. ‘Is it the next planet? Are we there?’ Seven nudged at her mind to enter his vision. Watching the patch of starry black space growing to fill the wall in front of her, Tabitha saw a new world crawling closer. Bigger. Brighter. It filled their view. Tabitha took control; felt gravity pull them towards the planet. Greeny-bronze continents and deep blue seas, streamed with twining clouds. She flared Seven’s jet scales to pick up speed. Stabbed his hard black body through the ozone halo, and dived into a blue sky beneath the stars. She felt Seven’s hard white stare and stony scales beyond the cockpit walls, glowing like fire as he dropped for the distant sea. Prepared herself for fresh disappointment, the closer they got. But her sad-statue face softened as they soared down.

‘That’s more like it,’ she mumbled, awestruck at the vivid world all around her. Her pulse quickened; the great unknown fizzled in her stomach. She watched the sunlight dance on a clear rippling ocean; strange bright coral submerged in frozen colourbursts. Shoals of things, black and canary-yellow, darting away beneath the rushing surface as Seven tore overhead. Suddenly he dropped and spun, diving in. Tabitha smiled at the twisting feeling in her stomach. Seven crashed through the water and burst from a cloud of bubbles, down into the bright blue deep.

Vast plants waved in a vague tropical seascape. Sunken forests loomed down here in the aquahaze, brimming with bright life, bigger than Tabitha could get her head around. They passed twisting crystal jellyfish the size of tower blocks. Shoals of eelsharks in colours there weren’t even names for. She could only smile and stare at the crowded sea life all around her; a dayglo tapestry under the waves. Something huge grabbed at Seven’s tail with a sudden jolt. The giant tug flung Tabitha back in her seat, scrambling for the console in a panic. Seven wrestled free and bolted. Colossal jaws snapped shut behind them, cheated, as Seven dashed for the surface and shot into the sky.

‘What the hell was that!?’ said Tabitha, looking back at a vast monstrous silhouette sinking away beneath the waves. Seven wasn’t thinking about it though. Maybe trying to hide his dented pride.

Seven’s engines rumbled on through the summer sky; a sharp black dot jetstreaming in endless blue. Before long they were descending over white sandy beaches; a sprawling continent. Out ahead lay miles of savannah, bright and weird and vital, rolling past below them and stretching out to the horizon. A furry lizard like a big cat watched them lazily from the limb of a twisting tree. Herds of red slender things galloped ahead of Seven’s shadow, leaping through endless scrubland and darting for safety. Tabitha breathed deep and relaxed in her seat, watching the new world unfold in all its gorgeous living colour.

Masked and suited, she stepped down from Seven’s wing in a silver desert. Smiled at the warming feel of the hot sun on her dark suit. Watched the platinum-coloured sand pouring and whispering between her black metal toes as she wiggled them. She heard the back of her suit hissing as it refilled its air supply; it had to be safe to breathe then. She pulled her scaled helmet back down into a fleshy collar. It just smelled like air; like Earth. And pure heat. Turning around, her breath caught at the sight. The desert was an endless silver moonscape under a dusty pink sky; vast outcrops of white-gold rock towered above an ocean of dunes.

Squinting at the bright sky as she walked on shifting sand, and flicking her greasy hair out from her collar, Tabitha found herself smiling at the warm summer feeling. An old song snuck into her head. A hot breeze danced white sand against her face as she watched the sea of sunhazy dunes, humming the long-lost tune to herself. Over there in the distance, clear craggy outcrops of glassy rock bathed the sand in focussed sunlight; spots of scorching light like giant magnifiers. The sand beneath them had fused to shining rivers of glass in the heat; vast sweeping curves of it that traced the sun’s movement. Big bright whale-things roamed the clear sky in the distance, coated in blonde moleskin that shimmered in the sun.

As Seven rested in the hot sand far behind her, Tabitha wandered out into the desert and squinted at tall cactus growths in the bright daylight. Sharp white birdlizards sipped beads of sticky nectar from the orange fronds, which slowly curled away from the high sun. Feeling the sweat on her brow already, Tabitha sat down in the plants’ shade. She lay back and sighed, slow and satisfied. Letting the warm sand ease the lonely cold of space from her bones. She watched Fishbowl floating up the dunes over there, like some weird octopial explorer; endless platinum cliffs hazed away beyond on an arid horizon. And death-black Seven there on the sand flats, neck bared and wings spread wide, devouring the daylight like he’d never get another chance. Closing her eyes, Tabitha could almost imagine that she was lying on that tropical beach back on Earth. This new world didn’t really feel all that otherworldly, when she thought about it. A lot of it felt... unremarkable, she supposed. Not really all that alien, with the wind and silence and the smell of hot fresh air. It was all just kind of... familiar.

‘Faaah!?’ she yelled in sudden shock, jumping up from her spot in the sand. Some scaly snake-rat burst up in an angry hiss and bared vampire fangs. Dodged her angry kicks and stamps and twisted away for the cactus trees. With one last snarl it scurried back under the sand in a frantic flurry, and tunnelled off through the dune.

‘Jesus!’ Tabitha snapped angrily, heartcore hammering as she watched it go. ‘Fine, I’m really impressed with your weird world!’ she told the desert around her, checking over her shoulder nervously and as she edged off back to Seven. ‘Not cool.’

Taking to the sky before she burned in the bright sunlight, Tabitha closed her eyes and smiled in the saddle as the harness grew around her. The warm rushing wind blew all the thoughts of space from her mind; she’d never known such a cold lonely place. Pulling on her breather helmet, she took Seven up through the clouds. His monstrous black shape lurked and peeked and scudded out from the mist, leaving a ragged stream in his wake. Tabitha watched the cloud whipping by on either side, and drew eye-to-eye with some strange four-winged pelican thing as it flapped and soared beside them. Another beside it, and another. The flock burped prehistoric calls and climbed higher in the pale blue sky; Tabitha just watched and smiled. Felt her suit warm her against the growing frost so high up. Looking down Seven’s side she saw the new world far below, spread out like a technicolour toybox. There was so much life here. Rich, weird, gorgeous life. She fell in love with it.

The silver desert gave way to arid scrub and rolling grassland; steep snowtipped mountains and dry rocky stacks. She watched a skinny waterfall in ancient peaks grow to a vast churning river, crashing and folding endlessly through creeks and gorges in a pearly-turquoise rush. The lonely birdflocking summits gradually fell away into rich windblown plains; a dancing sea of hardy bright flowers and shining marshy pools. Grazing beasts called out deep and hoarse in clouds of vapour, shielding their noisy calves from Seven’s shadow.

Flying high over vast green jungle, Seven slowed his jetscales and glided silently. Tabitha gave him free reign, and took her mask off. She sat back in the saddle to enjoy the cheep of alien insectbirds, darting like swifts in the blue sky around her. Gliding lower, Seven angled his wings in a giant whoosh that popped her ears. He caught at the air to slow himself down, hovered for a moment, and landed on a high rocky range to admire the endless forest below.

‘What is it with you and hills?’ Tabitha said with a smile, stroking his scarred neck as she unfastened the harness and leapt down. Seven shook his body like a giant dog and sat down on the peak with a crash, shaking the ground. Fishbowl floated out from his hatch and busied itself inspecting the overgrown plant life up here. Tabitha closed her eyes and breathed deep in the peace. Blinked them open, bright summer-yellow, and watched the endless tangled jungle stretching out to the horizon. Sighed in the warm damp air, and sniffed at tart heady plant-smells on the breeze that she’d never known before. Away behind her, Fishbowl’s searching tentacles rustled and squeaked against giant white blooms, like lotuses on steroids. Weird avisupials called and leapt between the wind-rustled treetops to inspect the aliens; giant feathered monkeybugs in faded-rainbow coats, staring from the leafy heights. Their stunted wings were more like clawed arms, with stubby useless feathers. Evolution at work. Tabitha looked around and couldn’t help but smile to see Seven and Fishbowl so at peace. They’d come so far together, just the three of them. It looked like they’d finally found a place to call home.

The new world must’ve been tiny; in a couple of hours they’d left the stark deserts and thick knotted jungles far behind. Gliding low over crystal hills and thick red grasslands, Tabitha felt a growing chill in the air as she watched their shadow ripple by from the saddle. Before long they were soaring over bleak misty heaths and steep hidden fjords, bright and rugged and wonderful. Norway on acid. Towering white clouds dwarfed jagged mountains in a chilly sky. Then she saw it, hidden beyond a high mountain range. A clear turquoise lake, vast as legend, reflecting the sky. A pale gold forest of strange bamboo surrounded it, stretching out across the foothills beneath the high sharp mountains. A perfect stretch of pebble shore, right there ahead of them, curved like a thin crescent moon. She didn’t need to ask Seven to land; he was already dropping to skim the lake.

‘It’s gorgeous, Seven,’ Tabitha mumbled on the shore, looking around at dark snowcapped mountains that stood impossibly tall beyond the forest. A small wooded island out in the lake. They’d landed in a country of silver and gold, walled on all sides by steep fells and fjords. Far off on her right, a colossal waterfall spewed white mist between craggy peaks, high in the mountains. Reptilian deer watched her cautiously from the forest in the distance, ears raised as they chewed golden grass. The slender trees here by the lakeshore were lead-grey; the leaves and grass striking madness yellow. Bright mothbirds sang and chirped overhead, shedding faint blue dust as they flew between the trees. She stood and stared for a moment; lost in all the chill colour of an autumn she could never dream of. This world was ancient, like something from myth. A cold raw beauty that wasn’t just in the alpine view, or the wind that scored the lake and rustled the trees. It was a feeling, right there in her chest. Wild wonder. Pure life, vicious and free. She wished Emma and Jen could see it all with her; that they could’ve met Liv and the Ghosts here. Talking in campchairs over steaming mulled wine, by a big cosy tent. Natalie too, watching the young twins running wild through the trees. Will, Paul and Jim fishing for dinner from the lakeshore, and Laika chewing a stick by the crackling fire. Her tribe, making a new life for themselves. Tabitha sniffled; smiling through her tears at the thought of them. Her red curls tossed and whipped in the wind where she stood alone on the rocky shore. Electric-blue minnowthings hovered and swam just there, in the sunlit shallows; the bright sun cast their tiny wiggling shadows on the coarse sand beneath. A new world; everything an alien species. Drying her eyes, smiling like a child, Tabitha couldn’t resist it. She had to get out and explore.

Batting a big persistent fly that buzzed at her ear, Tabitha left her monsters to rest and took a walk in the bamboo woods. Breathed in the freshest air she’d ever known, peaty and chilling in her nostrils, as she headed deeper into the forest. The fine papery leaves in here shook and rustled all around her in the crisp breeze; the soft sound filled her head and sent a tingle through her scalp. Even just reaching out a hard black hand to the woody bamboo, tracing a claw across the smooth grain with a whispering scratch, she was starting to feel connected with this world. Breathing its air, eating its light. That strange new side to her could sense it; how the new world and its new air was seeping into her lungs and her blood cells. How it was starting to make her up, one breath at a time, from its own elements.

The land rose gently as she walked on. There was white silvery lichen on the stones through here; dull gold moss shrinkwrapped ancient rocks at her feet. Crouching down when she glimpsed movement, she watched the tiniest primal spiderfish scuttling delicately over dead curled leaves. Looked up at the sound of small rustling feet, as a ratlizard scurried away through thorny weeds. Grey woody brambles swaying in the wind, hanging heavy with dark berries.

Every step showed her something new. Dripping glow-veined fungus on dead fallen trees. Two buzzing almost-beetles, horn-fighting by a toxic toadstool. A tunnelling lizard, coated in fine fur, wrestling an overgrown worm into its snapping mouth. Steadying her feet over bare gnarled roots, Tabitha rounded a see-through boulder of warped crystal. Ran her hand over its smooth weathered side as she walked by, staring into its glassy mass in silent fascination. She stopped suddenly at the sight of a resting mothbird just ahead. Clinging flat to a sturdy pine trunk; dusty feathers fading from black to brilliant oil-slick blue. She sat against a boulder to watch it for a while; this dinosauric moth as big as her hand. It just hung there, stock-still, feathered insect wings shaking with the wind. She watched in dumb fascination until it twitched and fluttered off like a sparrow. It darted through the trees and descended on a berry bush, hovering its meaty insect body like a hummingbird as it tugged a berry from a branch. Tabitha smiled to watch it, this strange clear-eyed thing, as it landed down to its meal. Wait, was there... something watching her? She turned to look, deep through the trees, where everything was just a distant shifting wall of bamboo. Could’ve sworn she’d seen something through there. Something big. Another sound off to her right. Staring through the endless bamboo, her eyes played tricks on her. She lost all focus and had to look away, like studying a picture to find the hidden shape. No, definitely more noises out there, like rustling footsteps. Away on her left this time. Deathly silence all around her. She felt her breath quickening. Walking back to Seven suddenly felt like a very good idea.

It was better out here on the lakeshore. She could see a good distance; see anything coming. Not like she couldn’t handle anything out there in the wild; she was confident of that. But it just felt better that Seven and Fishbowl were watching her back.

Well, maybe more Seven than Fishbowl.

‘Fire please,’ she said brightly, stepping away from a pile of drier branches she’d collected from the forest edge. Seven turned, disinterested, and blew a thundering gout of white flames idly over the firewood. ‘Thank you,’ she added, smiling, stroking the scales on his wing. She watched the pale flames dance and crackle and heat-haze on the lakeshore for a while, sending tiny orange specks flurrying up in the cold air. The wind guttered the crackling flames. Tabitha busied herself collecting rocks to circle her fire and shield it from the breeze. She sat down beside the fire to warm herself, looking out over the turquoise water that lapped on the shore. Grainy black soil washed up on the coffee-blonde clay, in dark rapid rivulets between the stones.

As the sun set Tabitha watched the tip of the highest mountain peak begin to glow softly across the lake. The snowy summit shone, dull and ghostly. She stared, hypnotised. Forgot to breathe for a moment, she was so mesmerised. By nightfall the eerie light had grown to a pale golden wisp above the peak, streaming high into the starry sky like tendrils of ghostly dust.

‘Gorgeous,’ Tabitha muttered, bleary-eyed, watching the dancing wisps reflecting in the lake. Seven sat and watched the haunted light intently, clearly keen to head up and investigate. She could see the attraction for him; it looked almost like the Northern Lights in miniature. Plus, they were on a high peak. High peaks were his catnip. But the mother of all jetlags weighed her right down, and the fire felt too nice to leave; she could barely keep her eyes open any more.

‘Just a couple of minutes. We’ll go together,’ she yawned, curling up beside the crackling campfire. ‘Give me a nudge in a bit, ok?’ she sighed, eyes closed, her arms for a pillow. The alien catsuit kept the cold at bay beautifully, like a skintight blanket. Seven breathed a deep impatient sigh. He watched the haunting lightshow on the close towering peak, hoped it wouldn’t vanish before he got to inspect it, and lay down on the starlit shore to guard her.

Seven waited. The red-haired creature was resting deeply, lost to the world. No sign of stirring; not even when he nudged her with his snout, as gently as he could. But that moonlight glow, on the peak across the lake... it wouldn’t leave his mind. An itch he couldn’t scratch. He tried to turn away from it, but over and over it tugged his attention back. The distant light tasted sweet, different than sunlight; subtle and tormenting. He had to know what was up there, and he had to know now. The tentacled creature kept raising its arms to the starry sky too, sensing a presence up there on the glowing peak. Pining for it, almost. Seven tried nudging the red-haired creature again, but she was practically comatose. Not tossing and turning and mumbling for once, either. He didn’t want to wake her, she looked so peaceful. Anyway, she’d be fine for a couple of minutes. He only wanted a quick look on the summit, then he’d come straight back down. There were no smells on the wind; no sounds in the forest. It was safe for her here. Seven opened up his hatch to let Fishbowl inside, and took off over the night-black lake.

As he drew closer, Seven felt a strange oneness with the twisting light on the peak. Flying higher for a better view, his white eyes fixed on a gigantic luminescence up there, somewhere between a tree and a mollusc. Bleeding endless cloudy rivers of glowing pollen that floated up in the night sky. Fascinated, he swept down among the alpine trees on the peak and found himself in a misty silent clearing. Opening his hatch, Fishbowl climbed out into the strange glow. Set about investigating the hardy shrubs and flowers up here. It caught one glimpse of the light source and floated straight to it. Alien insects twirled and shone in the air around the tall whispering grass. Unfamiliar stars filled the sky with a glowing chaos of shining pinpricks. Seven felt compelled towards the shining mollusc-tree in the heart of the clearing, as if its heavenly light was pulling him in. It was a towering growth, and monstrous in a way; but its light pulsed and pulled him on deliciously. Fluid organs shifted hypnotic beneath its clear skin; made him desperate to know what it was. He had to bask in its juicy light; to fill up on it. He’d never known light to taste so sweet. Drunk on the glow, he came in close and stretched his neck to sniff at it. Fishbowl beside him was transfixed by the blissful light, unmoving. Lost in that sweet painkiller glow. Caught in creeping moonglow tendrils that rose softly from the ground to strangle it. Seven saw and panicked, and knew to fight back and escape, but his muscles were numb. That, or he didn’t want to move. Such a soft calm feeling. He’d turn away in a moment; just one last look. One last taste of that mindfloating glow. The light grew brighter, painful, but Seven couldn’t look away. His hard white eyes grew wide; transfixed by that shining anaesthetic. By the time he felt a million little roots and tendrils rise from the dirt to wrap his feet and mesh beneath his scales, it was too late. His body was numb. Gentle as death the shoots spread like veins and reached into his nostrils, tickling his skull and webbing his brain. They fattened into strings and ropes as the ghostly tree fed them. Grew to a thickening cord of creaking fibres that gripped Seven’s head from the inside; pulled him sluggishly to the ground with a soft, massive thud. The starving tree dragged him in closer, tearing up the mossy dirt with his body. Moonlight shone softly on skywhale skeletons all around him; a glowing garden of bones.

5

Tabitha stirred, and squinted at the dawn sky. She looked around at a strange lakeshore and remembered where she was. Immediately she pulled up her hood, shivering against the winter cold. Her campfire was long-dead ash.

‘I told you to wake me up,’ she moaned hoarsely, stiff and aching from the pebbles where she’d slept. ‘Seven.’ Looking around the lakeshore, her monsters were nowhere to be seen. About to whistle for him, Tabitha thought better of it. There could be anything in those trees beyond the shore. When the wind blew in off the lake, she realised how cold she really was.

‘Bloody hell,’ she grumbled, hugging herself, teeth chattering. The sky was powdery pink, clear as a pool. A giant bird swept high overhead, diving down to skim the lake and pull a wriggling almost-fish from the surface with a wet splish. Tabitha watched the graceful bird flap and throw its slender body skywards with its catch, lost in the moment. Shining drops rained down from the struggling fish as the bird soared away. Tabitha felt the cold breeze tingle in her ears.

‘Seven?’ she asked the tree line; the empty shore. Tutting, dry-mouthed, she patted her belt for her water bottle. Must’ve left it in Seven’s cockpit. He’d be off exploring, she supposed. Probably up on that mountain peak across the lake. He never strayed too far though; he’d be back.

She’d been waiting a good while now, and still no sign of her monsters. She wasn’t sure how long, but the sun had definitely shifted through a good portion of the pale sky. Maybe she’d been wrong about the autumn weather when she arrived yesterday; with the wind up off the lake it was chillier than she’d thought. Today’s cold felt more like the January sales than Halloween. She stared around at the lakeshore, pale-faced in the chill, and thought about pulling her hood closed into a helmet just to keep her head warm. As gorgeous as it was here, it was bloody freezing. When Seven and Fishbowl got back they’d head for the grasslands and jungles again, further south. Settle somewhere with decent holiday heat, like their tropical island back on Earth. Unless her wayward ship was content to leave her freezing her arse off here, as seemed to be the case.

‘Seven! Come on!’ she called impatiently, glancing again at the sky and the sharp steep mountain peaks. She turned at the sound of a familiar snort from the trees behind her.

‘Where have you been? I’m freezing!’ she scolded him, as the bushes rustled and his dark snout edged out. Except… that wasn’t Seven. It wasn’t even Seven-shaped. Icy blue eyes followed her as its body emerged. Some glossy blackblue pantherwolf stared intently, lean and feline, stalking gigantic from the bushes. Bigger than any bear she’d ever seen.

‘Oh god,’ she mumbled, flicking out her claws. Staring in dread. The thing saw her challenge; her stance. It snarled, soft and hissing, like a phantom.

‘Seven!’ she screamed at the empty sky. ‘Get down here! Now!’ But nothing. There was only the fizzing lap of the waves on the lakeshore behind her; the call of strange birds in the cold morning air. Just her and the giant pantherwolf, prowling closer. With a ghostly gasp the animal ran and leapt. Dodging it, Tabitha slipped and fell in the gravel and scrambled away from it. It stood snarling; prowled after her up the shore.

‘Seven!’ she screamed desperately, her eyes fixed on the huge staring beast as it stalked her. It growled and pounced, clawing her as she leapt aside. Tabitha screamed and tried to escape it, clutching her bleeding arm. Caught herself in her terror. What the hell was she doing? Waiting for Seven to save her? Since when did she need saving from anything? The thing snarled as it came closer; she stood her ground and yelled right back. Ran and leapt and startled it with a jarring punch on the nose. For a second it shrank back in surprise; Tabitha jumped in again and clawed its neck. The beast’s movements were too rapid; its oily fur way too thick. Her claws raked it and barely reached its skin. She dodged its massive bite and punched its nose again, trying frantically to claw its eyes. It was fast though; faster than those hulking monsters back on Earth. Pouncing past and rounding on her, the pantherwolf jumped and forced her to the ground with monstrous strength. Pinned her with giant paws and clamped its teeth around her defending arm with a bloody crunch. Screaming in agony as it mauled her, Tabitha clawed at its cold eyes and bought a bleeding reprieve; staggering back before it could break her arm in its jaws. She crawled away and fumbled at her belt for weapons that weren’t there. Gun, knife; lost in New York. She staggered aside from another lunge and stumbled backwards over the dead campfire. Before she could even get to her feet it was on her, biting her arm as she threw it out to protect her throat. Screaming, bleeding silver, Tabitha wrestled in its jaws as it crushed her to the ground. Struggled and panicked under its massive strength on top of her. Its vile breath filled her head; its pale eyes stared death into her as it growled and bit for her face. Snatching up a charred stick from the dead campfire beneath her, she buried it in the creature’s eye with a wild bloody yell. The thing howled and leapt away; a chilling feline yelp that echoed across the cold empty shore. Tabitha gripped the blood-dripping stick and came at it, but the pantherwolf backed off and snarled. Her blood was boiling. Anger burned through her fear like kindling. There was only fury.

‘Fight me!’ she screamed at it, as loud as she could, storming towards it. Heartcore pounding. Arms streaming blood. She only had a few seconds to turn this fight around. If she didn’t bite back her terror now and show her strength, her dominance, then the thing would never give up. It’d try again; see her weakness and eat her alive on the stones. Watching her come straight at it, the beast backed off further up the shore, rustling into the bushes with its tail down. With one last snarling stare, it was gone.

‘Any time you want a rematch, you know where I am!’ Tabitha yelled hoarsely, throwing the bloody stick after it into the trees. ‘Fuck you! If you ever come back I’ll kill you!’ With that she collapsed on the pebbles, clutching her mangled arms in agony. Silver blood dribbled and streamed down on her catsuit; the ribbed scaled material knitted back together like skin. Tabitha sat and rocked and healed, crying in fright under a bright hard sky.

‘Seven, you bastard!’ she yelled up at the blue. ‘Where are you!?’

Cradling her arms miserably as she wandered up the shore, Tabitha watched the bright sky growing overcast to a heavy spraypainted gloom. She felt her mouth and lips getting drier, and wondered if the lake was safe enough to drink from. Common sense would tell her no, of course not. But her growing thirst made her think about it. It was right there, and all her energy had fallen off a cliff.

...Don’t be stupid.

There wasn’t any sign of fresh water through the forest; plenty of puddles but no rivers or springs. A growing ache in her muscles made it that much harder to walk any further. When the sunlight broke through the trees it hurt her eyes.

‘Shit,’ she mumbled sluggishly, rubbing at a headache. Resisting the urge to sit down by a tree. She turned to find her way back through the thick samey walls of bamboo.

As the day slowly darkened she felt more and more exhausted; eventually she had to sit down on the lakeshore before she fell. Shock maybe, or blood loss. Whatever it was, she wasn’t feeling right. The pebbles clacked and tumbled around her as she sat dizzily on the shore. The only sounds were the lapping lake; the bitter cold wind blustering in her ears.

‘Oh, god,’ she mumbled hoarsely, swallowing back a rising sickness. Stooped her head when she saw stars and felt her vision fading, and breathed deep against the nausea. Pulling her sleeve back to inspect her left arm, the bite marks didn’t seem to be healing right. The damage had knitted over, but there was a raised angry redness to her skin where the thing had mauled her. Inflamed like an allergy. Watching her pale arm goosebumping in the wind, she tugged her catsuit sleeve back down and hugged her knees to her chest. Tried to concentrate her thoughts on Seven, just in case she could feel him somehow. Like she had on the mothership. That was different though; she’d felt billions of connections running through the ship itself. Here though... well, it felt like it was just her. She waited a little longer, scanning the mountain peaks for Seven’s silhouette. Hoping he might just be sitting up there somewhere, watching her indifferently. But the truth bit hard in the back of her mind. No way Seven would’ve let her fight that thing alone. Something had happened to him.

‘No,’ she mumbled to herself, getting to her feet. The raw horror of that thought... it didn’t bear thinking about. That she was stranded here on an alien world, alone.

Sitting exhausted by the ashes of her fire, Tabitha tried desperately to get a wood drill smoking. Black hands rasping down the stick over and over as she spun it. She may as well not have bothered. Most of the wood here was sodden with damp; even the branches she’d snapped off fresh weren’t creating the friction she needed.

How did it go again? Tinder, kindling, small sticks, big sticks? She didn’t have any of that handy. She was pathetic; an amateur. She must’ve been at this wood drill for a good hour or more. As if there was any dry tinder around here anyway. How the hell had her ancestors managed it?

‘For fuck’s sake!’ she blurted out, throwing the sticks down in a sudden rage. Walked off up the shore, cursing at the world, and slowed to a sickly stagger. ‘Fuck!’ she screamed across the lake, clutching her aching stomach. Seconds later she was dry-heaving where she stood. The creeping half-blackouts were getting worse. There was a panic on her like she’d never felt before, like her body was urging her to do something and do it quick. Fire or not, she had to drink something.

Shivering when she pulled her hood back, Tabitha raised her cupped dripping hands to her mouth. Slurped at the cloudy water from the lake tide. A hard bitter taste, like soil. She spat it and wiped her mouth, coughing and gagging. How could water that blue taste so bad? Lake water was probably the worst thing she could drink; it was stagnant. A centuries-old soup of dirt, droppings and death. Without any fire to boil it though, or any fresher water close by... and with this sudden desperate sore-throated thirst... she’d just have to get by with it. Just a few sips to get her strength back, that was all. Suffer the bugs until she found a fresher source. She’d been growing slowly weaker and more parched after her fight with the pantherwolf. Had it poisoned her, or given her some kind of infection? Alien bacteria maybe, judging by its hot rancid breath. She felt dizzy from the lake water; sick. Had to sit down again on the shore, just for a while. She pulled her hood back up into a helmet, sealing out the cold world. Looked up at the sound of rustling bushes to see a pair of brown speckled squidlizards, no bigger than scrawny dogs, watching her hungrily from the edge of the forest.

‘What the fuck do you want!?’ she screamed at them, grabbing up a stone and launching it. She watched them scatter and disappear into the trees, and sat back down on the shore. ‘Tell your big friend to come back with you! I’ll kill you all right now!’ she yelled. Sat and stared furiously at the lake; checked over her shoulder again to make sure they’d gone. Felt a nervous lurch in her stomach at the thought of them creeping up on her.

‘Seven!’ she called across the lake. Her voice echoed on the still water that mirrored the mountains. She watched the wind send rippling waves across the surface, and rustle the trees on the tiny island out there. ‘Fishbowl!’ She waited for any kind of response; any distant roar or flapping silhouette. Sighing, she checked over her shoulder again. Three squidlizards now, staring in the distance by the trees. Thick drool swaying and dripping from their mouths in the breeze.

‘Get the fuck away from me!’ she screamed at them, running up the shore with her claws bared. Again they flinched and shrank and darted off into the trees. As she walked stiffly back to her dead fire, head pounding and sickness rising, a distant banshee howl chilled her to the bone.

It was tempting to just sit here on the shore.

Fear paralyses, she told herself. So, she got up. Gritted her teeth and walked for the forest. Had to find fresh water while she still had the strength and daylight left to look for it.

It was growing gloomy in here among the thick bamboo. The only water she found on her flu-shivering walk before the sun set was muddy and brown, puddling by tree roots and filled with rotten yellow leaves. It tasted just as bad as the lake, but she had to force down a few gulps. Just had to get some water in her. As she went to slurp another bitter dripping handful she noticed tiny black worms writhing in the puddle. It was full of them. She spat the water in sudden horror; made herself sick to heave it up. Raged and cursed and stormed back to the lakeshore, paranoid about whatever writhing things might be living in her now, and made herself heave again. Lake water it was, then.

That night she sat shivering among the bushes, just through the wind-rustling trees by the shore. Dry mouth; sleepless eyes darting to every strange sound in the black. She wondered if it was better to move on from the lakeshore, or stick around so Seven and Fishbowl would find her. Had they really just upped and left her, off to explore the new world on their own? Had she really been stupid enough to trust them so deeply?

‘They wouldn’t do that,’ she told herself quietly, with total conviction. They’d never just leave her like this. Something was wrong. Seven had been fixated on that mountain across the lake, and the eerie light up there. Maybe it was better to set off and look for them... but then all three could end up lost with nowhere to meet. And the way she felt right now, climbing that colossal peak seemed much easier said than done. Probably best just to find fresh water and stay put, so they could find her again. For now, anyway. Suddenly something pulled at her arm in the darkness; dread gripped her.

‘Hey!’ she screamed in shock, as a small lithe shape galloped off up the beach. Those same blinking dot-eyes, reflecting the dim moon. The squidlizards were back, and there were more of them. Tabitha went running at them with a war cry, the loudest she could manage in her stinging throat.

‘I’ll kill you, I swear to god!’ she screamed after them hoarsely, launching stones into the dark forest as they ran. She stood there listening for them until her legs and back were shaking weakly with her flu. Shivering in the cold wind, she felt so weak all of a sudden that she had to sit down. She needed cover, but didn’t dare head into the night-black trees with those creatures out there. Probably safer out here on the pebbles; she might hear them coming that way. Unless…

The bamboo driftwood floated wonderfully in the shallows, even if she did need to paddle out alongside to hold it together. At least the effort wasn’t all on her to stay afloat. Wading deeper into the moonlit lake, Tabitha gasped suddenly at the feel of the freezing water rushing inside her collar, before she remembered to seal up her suit hood.

Idiot, she told herself as she swam out, pale and shaking with the effort.

It seemed to take an eternity to kick and paddle out from the shallows; there was still what looked like acres of moonlit lake ahead of her. Tabitha sighed in her helmet and kicked out her aching legs in the water, drifting on.

It’ll be worth it. Getting to that little wooded island out there, it’d be totally worth it. She just had to keep telling herself that. At least there’d be no squidlizards and pantherwolves out there. Well, she hoped, anyway. Something massive bumped the driftwood from her hands and shoved her aside heavily beneath the surface. Tabitha’s heart was hammering. She stared all around her with rapid panic breaths, treading water in frozen fear. Something beneath her ripped the driftwood from her hands; a bamboo trunk smacked her hard in the face. It jolted away and vanished with a splintered crack down into the deep. Screaming, terrified, Tabitha kicked out in the longest, loudest, most terrifying swim of her life. Had to get back to shore. Every shaking stroke felt minutes long. The thought of whatever was lurking around right behind her, right beneath her, unseen below the moonlit surface, about to drag her under... she was pissing herself in the water. Whimpers came jumping out of her lungs despite herself. She didn’t even remember hitting the shallows, or wading for shore in noisy panicking sloshes. She fell down in a weak shaking terror on the clacking pebbles. Pulled her mask away and stared back at the water, to see if it’d followed her. Gasping for breath in the sudden silence. Looked right around her. Everything was calm in the night. She could feel the acid aching in her tense muscles. Wait... there. Glancing up at the forest edge, the squidlizard pack was watching her. Creeping closer. There on her hands and knees by the lakeshore, dripping wet and exhausted, she must’ve looked weak. Like prey. Tabitha dragged herself up and didn’t bother screaming any words this time; just an angry yell with a few flying stones to press the point. They were slower to retreat this time. It took a second volley of stones to scare them off into the trees.

‘I hate this fucking place!’ she screamed hoarsely at the stars, voice breaking, staggering on the shore. ‘Seven, get back here now!’

No way she was sleeping tonight. All the energy she had, Tabitha spent searching the forest for any fresh water. She had a splitting headache; her hearing felt muffled and every muscle stung. Tripped on every other tree root there was as she carried on deeper into the trees. What she’d thought was the sound of a babbling spring was just a grove of woody shrubs, leaves tapping together delicately in the breeze and the blackness. In the end she just had to kneel down at another stale puddle. Slurped cupped palmfuls in her desperate thirst, despite the writhing black worms she saw in the moonlight. It tasted bitter; tasted wrong. Retching, trying to keep it down, Tabitha stamped down the sick fevered feeling and staggered back for the shore.

She came around weak and parched at dawn, after a snatched sleep. She’d been up all night listening for the pack, and the pantherwolf. Resolved to kill them if they got close again, but they hadn’t given her the satisfaction. They seemed happy just to let her sit up all night, jumping at distant rustles and snaps, tense and terrified and waiting for them to come back.

Ring-eyed, sluggish, Tabitha looked around at the cold shore in the pale sunrise. Swallowed with a wince in her raw stinging throat. Felt so head-aching and exhausted that she even considered another few sips from the lake. Every gulp made her sicker, shakier. Made her stomach twist and cramp; she seemed to spend half her time pissing and vomiting to get the stuff out again. She had to find fresh water, somewhere. Had to set off now before she felt any weaker, if that was even possible. That was the problem though; it was absolutely possible. There’d come a point, soon, when she couldn’t even move. The thought terrified her. Tabitha dragged her feet up the shore with fresh urgency, wobbling weakly on the stones as she wandered up to the trees. Exhausted already, she leant by a tree at the forest edge and listened to the mothbirds’ dawn chorus.

Can I even walk out there today? She wondered, feeling a sore flu-trembling in her back and legs. I’m ready to collapse already. Unless she tried again to start a fire, here on the shore. Boil up the lake water and sterilise it, before it killed her. That had to be less effort than keep searching for a fresh source. It’d keep the predators away too.

If only I could get the bloody thing lit.

Mothbirds called over the cold mirrored lake. Her back to the wind, Tabitha piled the driest moss and twigs she could find in her ashy stone circle. Striking her metal claws together didn’t achieve the sparks she was hoping for. The stones around here weren’t flinty either. The sunlight wasn’t strong enough to catch through the clear eyescales in her catsuit hood; they weren’t enough like lenses for that to work anyway. There was only one other way to make fire that she could think of. The hardest. The one she’d already failed at.

‘Come on,’ she sighed at the wood, scraping a squeaking stick against flat timber over and over. ‘Come on!’ she growled, shivering in the wind. But the stick only rasped and snicked against the cold wood.

She carried on rubbing the sticks together until her arms ached and the grain had turned smooth, and then stuck at it some more. It was no use. She had to break away from it repeatedly to scare the squidlizards away; that was draining. All she needed now was for that pantherwolf to show up for a rematch. No way she was winning this time; she was exhausted. If that thing came back then she’d be a pile of shit tomorrow morning. She had to laugh at the thought.

I’ll be something else’s shit. Well, it was either laugh or cry.

The sun reached its low midday, and began to sink again. Tabitha stuck at her work relentlessly; sick of the sound of scraping wood. She had to start this bloody fire. Everything else would be so much easier once she got it going; it meant sterile water and a chance to get over this sickness. No more vomiting. Flames to frighten the animals away. Warmth and light in this cold dark place. Maybe even smoke to signal Seven and Fishbowl, then she could leave this bloody lake. All of it hung on the simplest, hardest thing, right there in her hands; impossibly out of reach. All she had to show for her day’s work were two smooth, shiny pieces of wood. She growled and threw them down in frustration, storming off into the bamboo forest. Teeth gritted, snarling, she punched splintering dents in the drumming trunks. Pelted stones at the mothbirds that fluttered away.

‘I’m so, fucking, sick of this place!’ she screamed. Waited for something to hear her. Prayed for something vicious to kill. She waited longer, feeling the hate fester inside her. The new world responded in kind with plinking raindrops, hard and cold.

‘Perfect,’ she mumbled, blinking up at the rain that darted down through the bamboo treetops. The first few splashes grew to a shower, as she watched wispy grey clouds wreathing the mountains by the shore. In minutes a noisy downpour had blown in on a howling gale over the lake, chilling her to the bone.

Dripping wet, Tabitha stuck to the tree line and headed off along the edge of the lake. Blinked at the flying rain as she clambered up boulders and tree roots to a small rockface beyond the shore. She crawled into a sheltered crevice there, with a slight overhang above it; a crooked grinning mouth in the short crag. Crouching down to look inside she saw a dry patch of rocky floor, about the area of a single bed, though jagged and uneven and looking deeply uncomfortable. Better than sleeping out there though, on the cold ground in the driving rain. Tucking herself into the sheltered gap, Tabitha pushed her soaking hair from her face and wrung it. Huddled down against the storm and listened to rumbling thunder fill the iron-grey sky. Below the crag were boulders and rocks, then the shore and the lake, its surface rippled and scored endlessly by the cold wind. Her wide rocky window streamed slapping tap-flows and waterfalls of rain from the tangled tree roots above on the crag. Struggling out, she opened her mouth in parched desperation to catch at it. She gulped the clear water in total joy until her full belly ached with it, and crawled back into the crevice with a fresh, flu-shaking satisfaction. Maybe the driving rain wasn’t so bad after all.

The storm let up just in time for the daylight to fade beyond the mountains. Shallow breath steaming in the cold air, Tabitha watched. Waited. Shivered. She pulled her helmet up, lay down awkwardly in her shelter and tried to fend off the sickness. Feeling too weak to bother getting up again, she watched the sun wither and die on another short alien day. She curled up tighter against the cold, and focussed all her thought on Seven and Fishbowl coming back.

6

Dawn woke her with an aching back; a sudden crooked agony.

‘Oh god,’ Tabitha muttered to herself, easing up stiffly from the jagged rock floor of the crevice. She felt something tickling her neck, and froze. ‘Oh, shit!’ she snapped. Chittering things crawled off her as she stirred, jolting her into a freaked-out escape from the tiny cave to brush herself down in disgust. There were a couple of big bugs still clinging to her; they dropped and scuttled off over the stones. Stumpy, cockroachy, ancient things, like grey-blue centipede crabs.

‘Bastards!’ she gasped, with a shiver down her spine. Shaking and brushing off again just to make sure. ‘Uhh!’

Angry red bites and a stinging rash had crept over her skin, itchy as hell. There was some kind of dust on her; a growing irritation. Stripping off quickly in fresh disgust, she ran into the lake and gasped at the freezing water. Scrubbed hard at her skin with her rough palms, desperate to get clean. She hated rashes and bites; the thought made her skin crawl like the bugs were all over her again. Psyching herself up to it, she waded out deeper and swam a little in the freezing water, getting her head under the surface just to make sure she was clean. Promptly swam back to the shallows at the sudden thought of whatever was lurking out there in the lake.

By the time the rash had faded, standing in the freezing water was unbearable without her catsuit on. Teeth chattering, droplets running off her pale goosebumped skin, Tabitha turned quickly at the sound of footsteps on the gravel shore. Staring in horror, she saw the squidlizards snatch up her catsuit like fleshy black roadkill and run off with it, fighting over it hungrily and trailing it off through the trees. Left her naked in the lake.

‘No!’ she screamed desperately, her shout echoing across the shore as she ran back out from the water. The pack was far quicker than her though; in seconds they’d disappeared into the forest.

‘Are you fucking kidding me!?’ she screamed hysterically, hugging herself tight. Freezing cold, she ran naked up the shore for the trees; no underwear since her capture on the Watchers’ ship. Screaming in a rage, covering up with her cold hard hands, she ran in through the trees. Desperate for any sign of the pack. Trying to survive here without her suit’s insulation didn’t bear thinking about. But the longer she searched for any tracks or shreds of fabric, the more she realised that she may have to get used to the idea. For as long as she lasted now, anyway. Shivering and pale, she hugged herself against the biting cold. Her same dank pile of ragged misery; now with a mouldy cherry on top.

I’m fucked.

Shaking out her numb limbs for whatever warmth it would give her, Tabitha wandered out from the edge of the dull gold forest further along the lake. Ghostly pale, shivering, she hugged herself tight against the tree-rustling wind and looked for anything that’d fend off hypothermia. Randomly occurring cloth and plastic seemed a little thin on the ground though. Even just a dead animal she could skin... anything to stop this stinging cold. No such luck. She had learned a valuable lesson though, she supposed, as she tugged at the biggest waxy leaves she could find to wrap around herself.

Never underestimate nature’s ability to take an even bigger shit on you, from an even greater height.

Figuring that it was best to keep moving to fend off the cold, Tabitha headed further on down the edge of the vast lake. Over here the shore was peppered with odd shuffling shapes; scaly skittles that were neither fish nor penguin. They stared side-on at Tabitha as she edged closer, making wary gump-gump sounds as she drew near.

‘Hi fishpenguins,’ she said with a lonely deflated tone, teeth chattering, clutching broad leaves around herself for warmth. ‘Nice world you’ve got here.’ Already some of them were shuffling away, staring all the while with their unblinking fish eyes. They waddled into the cold bubbling waves, slipped into the lake tide, and darted off. They were wise to get away from her; she was already sizing them up to make a grim bloody hat, or massacre them for a makeshift coat. Anything to keep some warmth in. The ones that stood their ground danced and trilled their dominance as she got closer, until Tabitha realised they were protecting clutches of eggs glued to gooey nests.

‘Sorry,’ she said gently, backing away. A real survivor would’ve seized the opportunity and killed them for their skins, she told herself. But she’d been civilised, unfortunately. Couldn’t bring herself to do it. Not yet, anyway. Time and desperation would tell. She edged off until the fishpenguins stopped puffing and dancing at her, and sat down on the shore as near as they’d tolerate her. It just felt nice to be close to less threatening life, after so many waking hours spent alone and hunted.

Watching the shore, the world was cold and grey and gorgeous. The dull sky reflected in the lake, like steel on dark polished glass.

‘Well, what the hell do I do now?’ she asked the nearest fishpenguin, while it preened its leathery feathers. She could smell its faint fishy shit on the bitter breeze. Watched it with tired eyes as it settled down gently again in its gluey nest, gumping quietly and ruffling up its scaly feathers against the cold wind. Tabitha stared at it, unseeing, lost in an idea.

‘Nest,’ she told the wary fishpenguin, her yellow eyes growing wide at the revelation. ‘Nest!’

Grunting with the effort, Tabitha hauled an armful of fresh waxy leaves up the short rock face and tossed it into the crevice where she slept. It felt good to be busy for once, and the work kept her from shivering so much. Filling the rocky shelter with as many leaves as she could, she crawled in and patted it all down into rustling bedding. Lying down exhausted with a steaming sigh, she shifted and shuffled in her makeshift nest. Lying there, thinking, Tabitha stared at the scummy rock ceiling and tutted.

‘This is really uncomfortable,’ she told herself, feeling every itchy leaf and twig on her bare back. She couldn’t decide which was worse; the weird peaty smell of the otherworldly leaves, or the biting wind that howled in to keep the stink at bay. At least her sickness was subsiding though; maybe the bellyful of rainwater she’d had last night. Wished to god that she’d collected more of it in some kind of container. She couldn’t just lie here though, thinking and shivering. She had to cover up, somehow.

Wandering the woods for any sign of something warm to wear, Tabitha dressed herself awkwardly in more of the same broad, three-footish leaves. Flicking out her claws, she scored out strips of soft grey bark from a skinny tree and tied them around the huge waxy leaves like belts. Piece by piece, she covered up with the dull gold wrappings and tied them on tight.

‘That’s better,’ she mumbled to herself, and tried a second layer of leaves to close up the gaps. A third rustling layer on top of that, wherever the leaves and mossy stuffing would fit, and she even began to get some feeling back in her goosebumping skin.

Itching like crazy at the feel of her strange golden outfit, she spent the rest of the grey daylight clawing thick shaggy moss off the glassy rocks that lined the forest puddles. It wasn’t like any glass she’d ever seen before; it scratched easily where she’d clawed at it. Everything seemed to take more effort in this damp cold world though, like the sunlight never quite filled her up; her head was pounding too. Climbing back to her nest, she dropped the big bundle of moss down and spread it out over her itchy leaf bed to try it out. Sighing with a little more comfort, and a tiny hint of satisfaction, she raked her softer top bedding closer against the wind to keep warm, and lay down to rest.

As ever, her next search for fresh water was a wasted journey. How was there no runoff from the land around the lake? Was it around the far side maybe, coming from the mountains? Aside from the water problem, she needed to arm herself too. Her claws hadn’t been enough against the pantherwolf’s thick shaggy coat. She needed something heftier. Something that could cut deeper.

‘I’ll make a knife,’ she mumbled, studying the larger stones around her on the shore. Coming up short, she staggered off for the stretch of forest where she’d gathered the moss.

The glassy rock was surprisingly easy to chip into a knife shape, almost like clear flint. If only it struck sparks too; she’d have an easy way to start a fire.

Rasping at it with her fingers, Tabitha smoothed the blade down into something less crude. Running it back and forth on her hard palms like a whetstone, she even managed to give it a sharp edge. Smiling, she held up the blade so the cold daylight glowed through it, and tucked it carefully into a belt of soft knotted bark around her waist. It wasn’t much, really... but at least it made her feel safer. Spirits lifted by her new success, she tried again to get a fire going on the shore.

A few frustrated hours later it still wasn’t happening. Carving a glass chip into a lens didn’t work either. Maybe the crystalline stuff wasn’t clear enough, or the sunlight too dim. Maybe the strange thistle down she’d thought to use as tinder still wasn’t dry. Endless hours of wood drilling and stick ploughing and stone striking; trying different materials, different places, shielding against the wind... whatever she was doing wrong, she just couldn’t see it. She had to give up again, on something so basic as fire; snarling curses at the sky.

I didn’t let my own world beat me, Tabitha told herself, breathing quick and angry in the silence. I won’t let this one either.

She woke in the middle of the night to the sound of tumbling stones. Sniffing noises in the black world. When cold blinking eyes looked up at her from the edge of the crevice, she didn’t dare move. Fear lumped in her dry throat as the squidlizard crept inside the tiny cave. Curling up slowly, cowering away in the back of the crevice, Tabitha whimpered in fear. Trembling. Holding herself tight as it approached, she heard it sniffing hungrily at her scent. She shrank away as far as she could, balling herself up. Looking vulnerable. Baiting the trap. Bolder now, the squidlizard crept in close and nipped her arm. Before it could bite harder she grabbed its throat and punched its head, with all the hate she had in her. Kill or be killed. She had no intention of being prey. Yelping, the thing struggled in her grip as she slammed it down on the rocky floor. Sprang her claws out to kill it.

‘Bastard!’ she snapped, clutching her bleeding arm when it bit her and wriggled free. Before she could grab its legs the creature had scarpered out of the crevice and galloped off into the forest. Growling, adjusting her leafy wrappings to cover up against the cold, Tabitha clutched her arm until the bleeding stopped. Just hoped that she hadn’t been poisoned. She sat and stewed in fury until the cold night pushed down on top of her, forcing her to exhausted sleep.

Tabitha woke the next morning with an idea so profound that she smacked her head on the scummy stone ceiling.

‘Rrr!’ she growled furiously, clutching her head until the pain subsided.

Good start. Rubbing her head, she crawled outside. The cold wind that haunted her constantly, even up here in her nest, suddenly seemed futile. Today she was going to beat it.

Deeper into the forest where the bamboo thinned out, the chunkier trees had a whiff of celery and cinnamon. Some weren’t dissimilar to prehistoric pines, thick and straight as temple columns, and covered in rough scales that leaked sticky pitch. Others were chaotic tangles of a dozen trunks like carved explosions; noisy mothbirds nested up in the high branches. But there weren’t the small saplings she’d been hoping for.

‘...No, that could work,’ she told herself quietly, hands on hips as she rethought her plan. She turned back for the bamboo by the shore.

The sharp knock of her crude glass axe was the only sound in the forest. White mothbird crap painted the rocks around her under the trees. Trying to cut down the bamboo took all her energy, and this was a skinny one. The axe head came loose from its stick shaft constantly; she seemed to spend more time reattaching it than using it. And all the while, she watched the forest around her. For eyes; for steaming breaths. Anything that might be hunting her. Giving up on the wimpy axe handle when it came loose again, she tossed it and just used the rock itself. Suddenly the work went that much faster.

Kicking the slender trunk with a shrill crack, the bamboo creaked and toppled with a rustling thump. Tabitha stripped the leaves and set at the wood again. Knocking the stone against the fraying timber, she dug in her claws and split away a three-foot length of trunk. Ran back to her tiny cave to try it out. Jamming it tight in the open face of the crevice like a fence post, she laughed at her victory and staggered back to her felled tree.

Arms aching, later that morning she hauled a stack of hacked timbers up to the crevice. She jammed each one into the rock face to fence off her nest inside; pounded the stakes in between the rock floor and the ceiling one by one. Filled the grinning mouth in the crag with a tight wall of bamboo teeth.

‘Yes!’ she yelled desperately at her new windbreak, running wild-haired back to the forest to gather the biggest leaves she could find. She was laughing; this was suddenly the best thing that’d ever happened. Nothing cheered her up more than the thought of not freezing to death. Slipping and staggering back up the rock face, she stuffed and threaded leaves tightly between her bamboo stakes to make a weatherproof partition. Walled off her crevice from the world and the wind and those fucking squidlizards.

She crawled inside her nest and blocked off the entrance entirely with a few more hammered timbers. Chuckling to herself, she lay down shivering and cosied up in her dark mossy nest, for as much of that safe warm feeling as she could manage. No more surprise visits from predators now. When the rain blew in that afternoon and pattered feebly against her new front wall, she couldn’t help but smile as she curled up tight in her nest.

‘Civilisation, mate,’ she told no one, nestling up a little warmer; a grin all over her face.

Tabitha woke up drained and thoughtless at dawn; felt her brain pounding in her head. Whether from dehydration or whatever bug she’d come down with now, she couldn’t tell. Felt so weak today she couldn’t move. If she didn’t force herself out of that bloody doorway though, she might never wake up again.

She had to stay busy; wanted to try another idea. Climbing down to the forest, she hacked down another bamboo weakly. She cut off a sealed section of the trunk, to make a kind of stretched cup. Walking down the gravelly shore, she filled it in the lake; the waxy natural plug in the bottom seemed watertight. A container.

‘Whoaa,’ she mumbled, dizzy and staring when she stood up too fast from the tide. Maybe I need to lie down for a bit. The bitter cold today probably didn’t help. Tabitha walked a couple of slow steps back to the crevice, and collapsed unconscious on the shore.

Falling snow woke her later, pinching cold where it’d collected on her skin. Bones bruised painfully from the rocks where she’d fallen. Getting up, sitting weakly in the tumbling snow, she shivered and tried to push the ground away in a daze. Her aching legs wouldn’t carry her; she could only prop herself up on her hands. Fevered and fuzzy-headed, wet and frozen in the wind, she looked around at the gravelly shore. The sea looked smaller, icy even. Far from tropical.

Wait… this isn’t the Pacific island though. No, that was wrong. She was on another world now. Seven was gone, and Fishbowl too. Just her and the wild now, and the biting wind. Pale and pink-cheeked, gasping cloudy breaths, she watched a fat fuzzy snowflake flurry down and punch her in the eye. Blinking it away, she looked around at a shore that was slowly disappearing under soft creeping snow. Scrambling weakly, heartcore working overtime to keep the cold at bay, she crawled back to her nest to try again for a fire.

Her skin burned when she woke up again in her shelter; sweat was freezing stiff on her forehead. Remembered, for a second, that she was supposed to be starting a fire. Floored by her fever, Tabitha tossed and hunched away from a dragging feeling in her legs. Felt another tug. Looking around, a squidlizard was trying to chew at her metal feet. She yelled and flailed weakly, driving it away from the crevice, wishing more than anything that she could have at least clawed it before it disappeared. She plugged the crevice entrance furiously with the bamboo stakes. Blocked out the tumbling snow. Her anger was short-lived though. Her strange weak chill dropped her to the bedding, trying to focus; grumbling fevered nonsense. There was something she desperately had to do. If only she could remember what.

Tabitha opened her eyes again slowly; turned her head weakly. Slits of sunlight peeked in from gaps in her makeshift wall. Frost crackled stiffly on her leafy clothes as she moved. Shivering, she dragged herself up and kicked out the door stakes to squint at the lightness outside. A snow-covered winter world, stark and bright. Her skull was pounding. Seriously, was there something burrowing through her brain? There was something she had to do though. Right now. What the hell was it?

‘...Fire!’ she blurted out, croaky voiced. ‘We need fire, Seven. We need it.’ Looked around for him. ‘Seven,’ she repeated, confused. Seven wasn’t here. Her teeth were chattering. She needed fire. She was going to die.

‘Gh,’ she told the freezing air, hunched and shivering violently in her icy nest. Pale and shaking, gripping two pieces of wood, she was desperately rubbing them in a fire plough to try to start a flame. Peering out from her nest partition at the bright snowy day, her arms shook stiffly as she grasped her two sticks. Looking down at them sluggishly, teeth chattering, she set one down on the rock floor and rubbed the other in a trench against it with shuddering hands.

‘Hh’, her lungs offered up, while the wood squeaked and whispered as she rubbed. Slowly losing feeling in her body, from the legs up. Her steaming breath shot from pale blueing lips in rushed flurries. She blinked away an oncoming faint and stared wide, focussing on her sticks. Lost herself in it. Before long though, her arms weakened and slowed and wouldn’t move any more. Her heartcore was freezing too; she could feel it humming slow and weak in her chest. Staring at the rocky floor, Tabitha drifted. Her body’s faint shivering was the only thing that still tied her to consciousness, and even that felt like it was ebbing away.

When even the stinging sensation of the cold on her skin had faded away to nothing, Tabitha knew she was in trouble. Not a drop of energy left in her to do anything about it. The nest around her was melting into black. She felt a sudden surge of adrenalin, or something like it. Her core shocking her into action, before it stopped altogether. As her thoughts came back, she was pissed off with herself. This was life or death, and she didn’t even have the numb wits left to realise it. She set to work on the sticks again, rubbing them furiously with everything she had left. Her gritted teeth grew to a furious snarl as the wood squeaked feebly. After everything she’d been through to get to this bloody world… was this how it was going to end? Freezing to death in a cave? Whatever desperate surge of energy her core had given her began to fade, and still the sticks weren’t even warm when she pressed one to her pale wrist. She set to work again. It was all she could do.

The tedious hypnosis wore off. Shivering uncontrollably in her suit of frosty leaves, Tabitha sighed desperately and dropped the worn pieces of wood uselessly. Felt the tears welling, running warm down her numb cheeks. Maybe this was it. Maybe this was how she died.

‘Seven,’ she sobbed quietly, trying to rub some feeling into her limbs. ‘Where are you?’ Stop it. You’re being weak. You can’t count on anyone. Stamping her sadness down, she grabbed the sticks again. Rubbed them angrily while a howling gale blew snow hard against the windbreak. Within minutes she was exhausted, and saw her hands and the sticks fading away in front of her. Corpse-pale, she stared without seeing. Feeble breaths steamed from her blue lips. Another couple of minutes, and she wasn’t even shivering any more. The current in her core fizzled out; she stopped breathing and slumped lifelessly in her bed.

7

Shaking, sluggish, Tabitha came back to a sharp stench of scorching wood. A dull buzzing. Grey smoke, thin and drifting. Her heartcore was pounding like she’d never felt; fighting for life while her own body had given up. Bleeding power. Looking down at the sticks in her hands she saw black lightning marks inching through the wood. Her voltage... it was coming out through her hands. The damp timber grew lighter where her current dried the moisture. The burnt lightning veins smouldered. Edging the sticks down gently, she fed them the driest moss she could find and watched it smoke. Gasped a shrunken breath as the wind whistled in under the partition, guttering the smoking wood. Staring silently, the feeblest flame sprang from the tinder and reflected in her wide gold eyes. Life burned tiny in its smoking nest; the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen. A single sprouting flame, no bigger than a birthday candle, danced on the timber and steamed the withering moss around it. The flame caught and grew to the size of her thumb, her palm, her hand, whispering a hiss through the drying moss. Crackling gently in the curling leaves. Suddenly it threatened to burn up her bedding. Shot through with a new energy, Tabitha scooped up the burning tinder and fed it. Carried it carefully down the rockface, like a baby bird in her hands. Hurriedly she set it down in a fistful of dry moss at the foot of the crag; one of the few nooks where the snow hadn’t fallen. Searching frantically for bigger sticks to build the fire. A race against time before the wind could gutter it out.

She ran for the trees and snapped off any twigs that weren’t completely soaked from the snow, and offered them reverently to the fire. A baby god among the rocks. She fed it thicker sticks and, cautiously, a chunk of hidden deadwood that didn’t look too damp. Watching with bated breath, Tabitha smiled as the fire took hold. Crackled and smoked. Laughing madly to herself, she huddled almost close enough to cook her skin beside the growing flames.

Glorious pins and needles spread through her limbs as she sat tending her campfire, and she set a ring of stones around it. She searched desperately for her snow-covered cup on the shore and scurried back to the fire. Packing snow tight into the bamboo tube, she held it carefully over the flame until the dripping wood was steaming and scorching black. Hard fingers glowing red in the flames, she watched the water begin to steam and bubble quietly in the scorched spout. She took it away to cool; sipped at it. Gulped it down to warm her through. Again she packed the scorched cracking tube with snow, and sat it between two rocks at the edge of the flames to boil. She sat back and let the glorious feel of the sterile water work its way through her body, and made more. Just kept boiling and cooling; blowing and sipping. Gulping it down until her full stomach hurt. Flushing her body with clean water.

Hours later the world seemed sharper again; drifting slowly from a drunken grubby-window view back to full HD. Thoughts came easier. Walking back after a long pee in the trees, she sat and sipped another cup of melted snow, and waited for her endless headache to finally subside.

Feeling renewed, or at least not feeling like death any more, Tabitha made sure her fire was well-fed and let the pale sunlight give her what energy it could. Her bamboo cup was cracked and leaking from the fire; she’d need something sturdier to keep the sterile water coming. Thinking back over her weak wanderings through the forest, she pictured the glassy stones where she’d collected moss for her bedding. Thinking how easily she’d carved her knife from the clear flint. With a withering sigh she pushed the ground away stiffly and wandered off for the trees, hugging herself against the sudden cold away from her fire.

She wandered out into a frozen world. Icy puddles like spilled set crystal. Every blade of grass at her feet, frost-dusted white on gold. She pulsed her current stronger through her body to keep the biting cold at bay. It was warming, but a constant effort; exhausting. After a couple of minutes she had to take it easy on the central heating and go back to old-fashioned shivering.

It took her the rest of the day to roll the glassy rock back to camp and start chipping away at it. Smacking a stone against the rock’s flatter side, Tabitha carefully knocked out one flying chip at a time. Shook her arm out until the aching chisel jolts faded from her wrist. Kept at it until she’d bored a broad jagged dip in the rock. She worked into the twilight, feeding sticks to the flames that she’d left drying at the fire’s edge.

Squinting at her work in the flickering orange firelight, she worked at the glass rock through the shivering night. By the time she was finished the mothbirds were chirping in the trees, and the dawn light crept into the distant clouds. Ring-eyed, exhausted, she finally plonked three big stones into her fire pit, and set down her big carved bowl on top of them over the flames. She gathered the whispercrunch snow from the rocks around her and packed it tight in the bowl over the fire.

‘Like a production line,’ she mumbled to no one, thinking it over. Wondered if she was going mad. She hacked down another bamboo to cut into several tubular cups.

The cold sun rose over the jagged mountains, setting fire to the lake with a pale ancient glow. Tabitha sat and watched it, the snow melting and steaming in the bowl, and for once she allowed herself a victorious smile. She dipped a fresh bamboo cup in the boiling water, and kept blowing and sipping and warming her insides until her eyes wouldn’t stay open any more. Sitting back against the foot of the crag, she fell into a warm peaceful sleep.

8

‘That was delicious, honey,’ said a slender blue-skinned creature, sitting at his kitchen table on a distant world. Sipping green wine from a far-flung planet and admiring the new crystalware. Sighing in full-bellied satisfaction. Retirement suited him.

‘It needed more spice,’ his wife fretted, already washing the dishes. She didn’t like the house robot washing them. It wasn’t careful. She watched the evening stars from the large curved window, and the lights of the towering supercity beyond the bustling jetway. An endless stream of floating lights where the aircar traffic flew home.

‘It was fine,’ her husband assured her softly, deep-voiced, coming over to hug her from behind.

‘It was tasteless,’ she snapped, matter-of-factly, shrugging away from him to scrub at the burnt-on food in the pan. ‘I messed it up. Again.’

‘Aelu, it was fine,’ her husband consoled her, trying to slip his three-fingered hands around his wife’s thin waist. To feel her soft blue-green skin. He tried to twine his tail with hers, like they did when they’d been young and infatuated. ‘Don’t be so hard on yourself,’ he said softly, amorously, in her ear. ‘Let’s sit down for a while. Come on.’

‘I don’t want to sit down!’ Aelu burst out, slamming the pan down in the sink to confront him. ‘They took our son from us, Raia!’ she screamed, her eyes filling with tears. ‘He’s gone!’

‘Come on, honey,’ he pleaded. ‘We’ve had a drink. You know how down we can get after a drink.’

‘I’m allowed to grieve for our son!’ she snapped.

‘It’s been two years, Aelu!’ he shot back. ‘How many times do you want to dig this back up, huh? What, you don’t think this is hard for me too? I loved my boy more than anything!’ Aelu didn’t reply; just stood there sobbing. ‘How long do we need to grieve?’ he said, wiping his tears. ‘Why do you want to keep making this harder!? We need to get on with our lives!’

‘How can you even say that!?’ Aelu screamed, backing away from her husband as if he’d harmed her. Her eyes were wide, angry; streaming tears. She clutched the kitchen counter as if it anchored her to the world. Stopped her crumbling all over again.

‘You think I don’t miss him!?’ he said angrily, his pointed ears dropping flat behind his head as his temper flared. ‘The Guardians did everything they could!’

‘You still believe that!?’ Aelu snapped, staring in disbelief. ‘You still think they’re the good old Guardians you signed up to!?’

‘They’re on our side, Aelu!’ he barked. ‘They did everything they could to find him! How many times do we need to go over this?’

‘They’re with the mob!’ his wife screamed, hurling a glass down to shatter over the pristine floor tiles.

‘They’re the fucking Guardians!’ Raia bellowed back, like the Ministry police were up there with the Gods themselves. Virtue distilled. ‘They did everything they could! We did everything we could! Ori’s gone!’

‘And I want justice for our son!’ Aelu screamed back. ‘I want that gang dead!’

‘They could be anywhere in the galaxy by now!’ Raia countered.

‘Why should that stop us getting justice for him!?’ Aelu snapped, looking at her husband in disgust. ‘Why should that stop the Guardians finding them, and arresting them? Isn’t that what we pay all these bloody taxes for!?’

‘The Guardians did everything they could, love,’ he consoled her, trying to take it down a notch.

‘Then fuck the Guardians. It’s not good enough,’ Aelu spat back, storming out of the kitchen. ‘Useless bastards!’

‘You don’t mean that,’ Raia said darkly, following her.

‘You’re more loyal to the Guardians than our family! You always have been!’ Aelu screamed. Raia’s staring silence said it all. She knew they’d always come first to him. And she was ok with that. Until the last couple of years, when justice was nowhere to be found.

‘They let our son die, Raia!’ she yelled beside the couch, wiping her eyes. ‘They didn’t come to the call-out, they didn’t even go off-world to follow that gang! They’re probably friends of theirs! The Guardians are nothing but crooks themselves!’

‘Aelu!’ Raia threatened her rigidly, stepping close. ‘Mind your tone!’

‘No!’ she countered, turning to stand up to him. ‘The Guardians are lazy bought-out scum and you know it! That’s why you left them!’ Aelu got his hard strong palm in response. Clutched her bleeding lip, shocked and frightened, and watched him warily as she got back to her feet.

‘I said, mind your tone,’ Raia snarled. He towered over her; six feet of angry muscle. The same six feet of muscle she knew she was marrying all those years ago. But kind and gentle, once upon a time, before their son was murdered. Drinking harder ever since. But he’d never been hers, not really. He was still Guardians property, even years after retirement. To him they’d always come first.

‘That gang’s still out there somewhere,’ she said quietly, ignoring how much he’d hurt her. ‘I’m sick of waiting for the Guardians to get off their arses and do something. I’ll find them myself. I’m going to get justice for our son. Even if you won’t.’

‘Aelu,’ he warned her. ‘You’re not thinking straight.’

‘I’ve been thinking straight ever since they took him from us,’ she countered. ‘The Guardians won’t help us. Nobody’s ever helped us. I mean, look what it’s done to us, and no one’s even been questioned! I want revenge for our son, just like the old days before the fucking Ministry! Our family-honour demands it!’

‘You’re being ridiculous,’ Raia told her. ‘These aren’t the old days any more. Things are more complicated. Come and sit down. Now.’

‘Fuck you,’ Aelu said through gritted teeth, heading for the door. Raia said nothing. Just stormed up behind her and slammed his palm against the front door, barring her way out.

‘You’re not going anywhere,’ he growled in her ear, gripping her arm so hard it hurt. ‘We’re going to sit down and talk this through, before you go playing vigilante and get yourself arrested. Or worse.’

‘Get off me Raia,’ she threatened him, tensing up. He tried to pull her back into the living room. ‘I said, get off me!’ she yelled, striking out. Her husband rubbed his sore jaw in shock, staring at her. Animal intense. She’d hit him, for the first time in their marriage. Broken the ancient law.

‘Raia,’ she cautioned him, stepping away. His staring eyes were boring through her as he came closer. She fumbled quickly for the door handle. She knew that look in his eyes. Raia wasn’t in there right now. There was only drunk anger. A rabid growl was the only reply she got. And he’d said this wasn’t the old days any more. We’re part of the Ministry worlds now. We’re more civilised.

‘Raia!’ she screamed, throwing her hands up to protect herself. His punch knocked her head hard against the door. Aelu’s ears were ringing as her limbs crumpled in shock. She fumbled again for the door handle in a daze. Felt her husband’s big hands grab her shoulders and throw her to the floor. She’d taken his anger for years; she could take a hit by now. But no more. Before he could hit her again where she lay Aelu grabbed up the metal doorstop beside her and swung it hard against his head. She staggered to her feet as her husband dropped, and rushed to open the front door. She looked back; slammed it shut on him as he yelled and growled on his hands and knees, bleeding in the hallway, clutching his head. She locked the door hurriedly from the outside and tossed the ornate key fob in the river across the road. Checked the dark lamp-lit street for anyone watching her, saw it was clear, and ran into the night. Searching the darkness for the vengeance she’d never had. For the ones who’d stolen her only son; her son’s future children; their family’s future. She thought of her ancestors, before the Ministry laws, and what honour drove them to do for Family in times like these. What it was her duty to do, fearlessly and without mercy, and fuck the Ministry laws that said she couldn’t. Following her cheated motherly pride wherever it dared take her. Hers was the pain and the fury. The Gods would guide her revenge.

9

Tabitha stared at the stick in her hand, sitting on the shore by the lapping lake tide. Tried to run her current into it and make it burn. The first time in the cave had been some kind of reflex response, from her core; this time she wanted to will the voltage from her hands. She gripped the stick tightly, staring, like she was trying to drill a hole through it with her mind. She blotted out the chirping mothbirds, and whatever else kept shrieking and singing in the snowy forest. Focussed every thought on the stick, like a kung fu student in some movie montage. She urged her heartcore to speed up, whirring like a mini reactor in her chest. Pushed at the thought like her life depended on it. Which it did, if she ever hoped to start a fire again and survive this place. She felt her core begin to hum. Drew on the current in there.

‘Please work,’ she whispered desperately. Closing her eyes, she pulled on the current with her mind. Breathed deep in the winter wind that tousled her hair. She imagined voltage creeping into her arm like oozing fluid, hot bright electric blue.

Come on. Dragging it, pulling at it, she felt the current snaking slowly up her forearm, through her wrist, through her hand, into her fingers... she heard a buzz. Smelled smoke. Opening her eyes in shock, she saw the wet stick growing patterned in creeping black tangles as it scorched. Felt the voltage, her voltage, moving from her hands into the wood. It was starting to burn; tiny sparks twinkled in the growing black lightning that edged through the grain. Standing up to hold the stick at arm’s length, she fixated on it with an angry stare. Drew on her humming heartcore. Forced a crackling surge of voltage through her arm and watched the stick smoke and flare, burning bright and fierce and hissing until it charred to blowing smoke in the wind. And then… she laughed. Crushed the fresh charcoal to tumbling dust in her hand, and laughed at the lake and the biting cold. She stood there shivering, heartcore soaring, with the power to make fire right there in her hands. Grinned an exhausted fuck you to the wild world.

Sitting on the rocks below her nest, Tabitha warmed herself by a fresh crackling fire. Took in the rare sunshine and slurped a cup of steaming water. She watched the lake and the mothbirds in profound sudden peace, and for one fleeting second felt the roots of the world. The feeling vanished as quickly as it came.

The towering mountain across the water, the tallest of the lot… that was where the strange light had sprung up the other night. If Seven was still alive, and hadn’t just abandoned her, he was up there. It had something to do with that wispy light, that’d disappeared ever since; she was certain of it. But she’d never make the climb without something warmer than the bloody leaves she’d tied to herself. A few furs wouldn’t be enough either; not from the look of all that ice and snow up there. She needed her catsuit back, and for that she’d have to face the squidlizards. They could be miles away for all she knew... but she’d already made up her mind. She was getting her friends back. For what seemed like the first time in her life, Tabitha sat and came up with a plan.

‘They always go for my arms,’ she mumbled, thinking over all she knew about the squidlizards. ‘So... they can have them.’ She looked over at the trees lining the shore. An idea.

Hacking down a bamboo with her stone axe head, Tabitha cut a foot-long piece. She stood it up on a flat rock and split it down the middle, with her knife and a stone, in a sharp solid crack. She took the woody halves and scraped out the spongy flesh, and closed them back around her forearm like an armoured tube. Peeled strips of bark and tied the halves tightly together. Sniffling and wiping her runny nose in the icy wind, she gave her new wooden bracer a couple of hard knocks to try its toughness. Set straight to work on some matching greaves for her shins.

Just walking in the forest came a hundred times easier, now she was free of dehydration and alien flu. Sounds were clearer, her sight was sharper; the fire and clean water had given her chance to get a bloody grip.

Reaching up into rustling leaves, Tabitha wrestled a seed pod from its branch with a squeak. It was waxy and leathery, like a tough cacao. Turning it in her hand, she tossed it and reached in for a bigger one. Sliced it from the branch and dug a claw in the end. The flesh was firm and springy; carveable. Grabbing a couple more from the branches, she headed back through the forest for camp.

‘I hate you Seven,’ she said as the thought occurred, and wondered what the hell had happened to them up there. If they were up there, anyway.

Digging out a water bottle neck from the pod’s waxy flesh, Tabitha minced its insides with a twig and washed it out. Setting it down in the rocks, she turned her attention to the knobbly clumps of pitch that she’d clawed from the ancient pines. Someone on TV had used it for glue; she remembered that much. The sticky dry resin smelled so much like cinnamon that she was desperate to chew on it, just for a taste... but she knew how that’d end.

Carving a rough glass dish, she placed it carefully on the rocks over the fire to let it heat up, and dropped in the first sticky chunks of pitch. She watched it with all the fascination in the world, because what else was there to do around here, and gently stirred the sticky goop with a twig.

It took ages to melt the pitch to a syrup. When she did set a glob of the stuff between two sticks like glue, it barely stuck. She even managed to drop the whole batch in the fire, when the bowl wobbled and fell off the hot stone where she’d perched it.

‘Shit shit shit,’ she growled quietly, clawing what little bubbling resin she could from the flames, as her morning’s work boiled and smoked in the embers. She slopped the glob angrily back into the bowl and scraped it off her claws, lumps of ashy charcoal stuck in with it, and tried to fire it again. Stabbed the chunks of charcoal angrily into dust with a stick, and mixed it in. To her surprise, the gloopy black mess stuck more firmly than anything else she’d tried.

‘It’s the charcoal,’ she mumbled, as if Fishbowl was watching just over her shoulder. ‘It’s made it more gluey.’ Checking herself, and the fact that she was crouching there crazy-haired and talking to no one, Tabitha cleared her throat and tried to look normal. Stirring charcoal glue though, dressed in leaves and stranded on another world... normal was kind of a big ask.

Lifted by her new success, Tabitha grabbed the short chunky stick she’d brought back with her. Slipped her knife from her bark belt and carved the soft wood into a stopper. Burrowed it into the seed pod neck with a waxy squeak. Tying thin soft bark around it, she filled the pod carefully with boiled water, and knotted off her new water bottle on her belt. With her flintglass knife freshly sharpened, and half-wrapped in glued softbark for a grip, she tucked it in her belt and set off for the western side of the lake.

It was a clear day, and colder for it; no clouds to insulate the ice-blue sky. Tabitha warmed up as she walked though, wrapped tight in her crazy-woman leaves and bamboo limb guards; glad of her water bottle once she reached the hilly far side of the lake. The lack of sleep made her feel strangely euphoric. The sound of whispering grass on her hard feet sent blissful tingles through her scalp. There was a smell on the chilly wind though; something heady and rot-sweet. Following her nose as she wandered, she found the source close by in the trees.

‘What the hell is that?’ she muttered quietly, stepping closer to a slimy brown cluster by the edge of the forest. Two feet tall at least. It was an oozing fungal mass; black gunge bubbled and popped from primordial pipes. Flies danced around the rotten smell; caught and digested on the tubes’ sticky sides. The thing was... pulsing.

‘Nope. Nope,’ Tabitha said flatly, hands up, quickly walking away as her skin crawled. Glanced back as a slick grey tongue crept up from the largest tube, and mopped up the flies down its sides. ‘Nope,’ Tabitha repeated louder, walking away faster on the crunching shale. Now that she was aware of the thing, she couldn’t help but see more clinging to the damp tree trunks along the lake. Shuddering, she crossed down the stony shore to walk along the tide instead.

Braving the edge of the forest where the disgusting fungus didn’t grow quite so thick, or smell quite so bad, Tabitha wandered in through the damp bamboo until the cold wind faded. She batted at frantic flies clouding around her head, and crept further into the woods than she’d ever been before. Pulled her knife to cut her way through dense brambles. At least she didn’t feel cold any more.

She seemed to have been cutting her path for hours before the snaring brambles thinned out. Walking on a little easier, she noticed a dark sliver in the corner of her eye.

‘Uhh!’ she snapped, gripping the vine tight and tugging it from her thigh. It stuck like the end was glued there; another painful tug and she saw in horror that the spindly plant had been leeching her blood. She flung it down in the undergrowth; squeezed at the numb bite on her leg in case there was any venom. Re-tying her leaf wrappings extra-tight around her legs, she shuddered at the thought of more vampire plants around her in the undergrowth. Hacked her way through with fresh haste.

She was exhausted by the time she reached the top of the hill, and for all her endless cutting and climbing it hardly gave her any view at all. Tired and aching, grubby and wild, Tabitha hitched her ragged leaves back up over her bum crack, and scratched her fly bites. She pressed on through the trees, and stumbled on big clawed paw prints where the grass and soil had soaked to mud. Looking around her, suddenly it was clear why her feet had kept to this meandering line through the trees and slopes. A little more worn than the ground around it. She’d been on the pantherwolf’s hunting trail. Dread churning in her stomach, she looked around at the bushes for any movement, and ducked behind a tree to check if it was around. Heartcore hammering, teeth chattering in the wintry air, she studied the muddy stretch of trail again. There were other claw prints there too; much smaller. The squidlizards. Her anger beat her fear.

‘Where are you, you thieving bastards?’ she growled, pushing back through the bushes for the tracks again. Tightening her grip on the knife, she followed the prints up the hill towards the craggy rockface beyond.

Tabitha sank down and watched cautiously from the bushes. There were more squidlizards in the pack than she’d expected; resting and panting in a sunlit patch below a shallow sloping cave. The longer she sat and watched though, the more things became clear. Some of them weren’t moving as they rested; their chests should’ve been rising and falling like the others that lay close by. They were pale and still. Dark stains around their strange squid jaws; fleshy tatters of her alien catsuit. Sure enough, they’d been eating it. Whatever the fleshy material was, it’d killed them. Fewer to face then, though the rest of the pack looked fierce enough. But there was only one way she was getting that suit back.

‘Ok,’ she sighed, in a shaky whisper; sprung her claws out. There wasn’t room for hesitation; no way to pick and choose which ones to fight. She’d have to go for the big one up there, with the scaly mane. The alpha, from the looks of it.

Kill the alpha, and the rest should scatter. In theory. The Theory of Wishful Thinking.

Deep breaths. Tabitha tightened her grip on the knife, gold eyes fixed on the alpha. She sprinted at them from the trees, yelling at the top of her lungs as they startled and shrank away. Any hesitation was weakness; the food chain didn’t tolerate weakness.

Be fierce. More fierce than anything else. The squidlizards made squelching barks around her; running for her. Snarling, Tabitha booted one to the ground as she ran across the clearing; dropped another with a punch in a dull metal thump. Tackled a pouncing third by the throat in a feline tumble, bleeding silver; smacking it down and clawing it with a yelp when it didn’t get the message. The alpha was charging for her, fangs bared. It closed the gap and pounced. Teeth gritted, Tabitha jumped into the fight and fed it her left arm. The thing bit down powerfully on her bracer with a bamboo crack. Just like she’d practised on the shore, she let the animal pull her off-balance. Working with its strength, its momentum, she shifted around to straddle its back and fall on top of it. Pinned it to the ground as it savaged her wooden armguard redundantly. Before the rest of the pack could pile in to mob her she raised her knife and buried it in the alpha’s head with a bloody spurt. Heard it whimper and die, falling limp beneath her. Yelling at the barking pack as they surrounded her, bloody-faced, Tabitha held her arm out and fed the bracer to another that came running in. She felt its jaws clamp down and tug her powerfully, and fell down on top of it. Stabbed it hard; again. Knelt over her kill, knife out; teeth bared and glaring wildly at the rest. Any that left her alone, she left alone. Any that attacked, she attacked. Those that gave up on the fight, she let go. After a brief bloody confrontation, the survivors skulked and stared from a safe distance.

‘You shouldn’t have taken my suit,’ she growled at them, clutching silver-streaming wounds. She walked over to the small cave, retrieving her catsuit’s tattered remains. She took one look at the wall-eyed young ones, staring in fright, and felt like she should pity them.

Wait. That’s not dominant. Right here, right now, she was dominant. No weakness; they had to see that. They could come for her when they were grown and kill her in her sleep, for all she knew. They had to learn to fear her. I’m above you in the food chain. Get used to it.

‘Don’t take my stuff,’ she warned them, pointing her knife at them as they watched her go. She checked the cracks and toothmarks in her bamboo armguards, impressed with how well they’d worked. Suddenly the new world didn’t feel entirely shitty any more. She was winning for once. Studying her ruined catsuit though, it wasn’t healing like it usually did. But it wasn’t like the Watchers to make anything so fragile. Maybe if she gave it a helping hand, her second skin could heal. Glancing over the squidlizard bodies as she headed back through the clearing, she had an idea. She grabbed the big dead alpha by a strong skinny leg, flashed the pack one last warning glance, and dragged her kill away into the trees.

Tabitha stood staring at the dead animal and wondered if she should’ve done what she’d done; wiping out half the pack like that. She felt guilty as hell. Until she remembered... that was old thinking. Civilised thinking. A way of seeing the world through the luxury of safety, in a race that’d lifted itself from the food chain. On this new world though, the wild wasn’t quite so soft and cuddly. Things wanted to kill her; eat her. Or worse – eat her first, and kill her over a long while. If she lived by her old civilised thinking, she’d die by it. Dragged off in the night and eaten alive.

Fuck sentiment, she told herself, as she pulled the alpha’s body away. I’m fighting for my life.

Sparking a fire in the forest, she dropped the ruins of her catsuit down and pulled her knife. The squidlizard’s scaly hide cut easier than she’d expected. Piecing together some half-remembered TV shows, she guessed and slit the creature’s skin from arse to throat. She sliced the webbed connecting tissue beneath, carefully, and gradually rolled the slick skin off its lean muscles. Gagging at the gut smell, and batting away the chunky flies that’d appeared already. She knew that everything on the body could become food, or tools... but she didn’t need food. She didn’t plan on sticking around.

Find Seven and Fishbowl; leave. That was the plan. She was sure the forest would find its own uses for the body. Tree crabs were already scuttling over at the scent of carrion, nipping and plucking at the meat.

‘Shoo,’ she told them, trying to brush them away from her work without hurting them. Funny, she thought, given her recent massacre; though the crabs weren’t exactly going for her throat. She knifed a few chunks of meat from the body and tossed them away, to keep the strange ancient crabs busy while she skinned the bloody mess. Probably should’ve hung and bled the body first, she supposed. She’d know for next time, at least. And just hoped there wouldn’t be a next time.

Her muscles stiff and sore, Tabitha stood back from her finished work and stretched her aching back. So she’d skinned it; what else was there that she could use? The phrase guts for garters kept ringing around in her head. She’d seen something about it on TV; she was sure of it. Making thread from sinew, something like that. Once she’d sliced a tendon from the thing’s hind leg though, she realised that was as far as her clumsy metal hands would get her. Any finer work was impossible; she may as well have been wearing gauntlets. No way she was making twine from that stuff.

‘Guess the bone needles are out of the question too,’ she mumbled, disappointed that her shiny new thought was a burst bubble. All of a sudden her idea to stitch up the gaping tatters of her catsuit seemed futile. But there had to be something she could do to make it wearable again; to keep out the freezing cold when she climbed the mountain.

Cutting slices in the pines around her, and knifing a chip of bark for a spatula, she melted down pitch and charcoal to glue the chewed edges of her catsuit. Some rips and holes glued up fine on their own; in a few places though the material had been torn away and eaten. Gluing the edges of the gaps, she cut down the slimy squidlizard hide and stuck it together in a morbid patchwork with her catsuit. Probably should’ve treated the stinking skin somehow to preserve it, but she didn’t know how. Still, it was only a temporary fix.

Tabitha tore off her leafy makeshift clothes, naked and freezing in the winter wind. Picked up her patched catsuit excitedly, and ran into a problem. The material was lifeless; it didn’t shift and wrap to her like it used to. Even better – she’d glued it shut, like a wetsuit with no zip.

‘Idiot,’ she scolded herself quietly. Sighing impatiently, naked and shivering, she knifed the front of her suit open from neck to stomach. Teeth chattering, she pulled on the legs and arms blissfully.

‘Oh you bloody beauty,’ she mumbled happily, hugging herself warm and tight at the windproof sensation. Melted up the last of the pitch and dabbed it carefully up the front to glue herself in. She just stood for a while then, eyes closed, making a quiet human purr. Suddenly the bitter wind was a distant memory; her core could stop playing central heating system and finally rest. She had her skin back; her real skin. Felt her muscles ease; felt like herself again... but didn’t feel whole. She still felt the loss like she’d been torn away from him, thread by bleeding thread. She missed her Seven, self-assured and vicious. He was still out there, somewhere.

I’m getting him back, she told herself. And going straight through anything that tries to stop me.

10

The foothills of the mountain were strangely peaceful; a damp silver-gold world dotted with bright pale flowers, bobbing in the breeze. Smaller mothbirds lived up here, speckled brown or striking monochrome, foraging in woody alpine blooms.

As Tabitha climbed above the tree line though, the cold wind hit her at full force. She pulled up the hood from her catsuit collar to keep the frostbite chill from her ears. Looking up, all she could see were rugged slopes stretching into the white mist high above. Higher still, and the mountain’s jagged peak was shrouded in vast wreaths of ghostly cloud. It looked as if a storm brewed and twisted up there on the summit, casting all the world in a dull gloom.

‘At least the ground’s easier up here,’ she panted to no one, walking a stretch of flat heath towards the towering slope ahead. Leaping a stretch of stagnant fly-dancing water, she was suddenly stuck up to her knees in squelching black bog, invisible under the thin turf. Gasping in shock, staggering in the cold slick stink, Tabitha instinctively tried to push herself up with her hand and promptly sunk her arm in up to the elbow. She growled and grumbled, tugging herself free from the grasping mire in a slurping suck. Her next footstep stuck fast. Caught off-balance, she splatted face-first in the cold black mud. It stank of rot; eggy and festering.

‘Oh for god’s sake!’ she growled at the marsh, gasping and filthy. It was too big to edge around; quicker straight through. She tugged her legs free only to slip and stagger in freezing brown water ahead. Soaked in the stinking stuff, she dragged herself through the oily black bog on her hands and knees. Spat the vile bitter taste from her mouth; crawling on for the foot of the mountain in a rage.

Those two better not be dead when I get up there, she told herself angrily. I want to kill them myself.

Clearing the bog, exhausted already, Tabitha sank her claws into the peaty slope and started her climb. She didn’t notice the creeping fog around her until she was right in the thick of it. The endless view had faded to a pale dead murk; all she saw were the rocks and grass slopes a few feet around her.

It wasn’t long before the mountain threw a downpour at her; bouncing hail rattled through the world and stung her cold cheeks. She was clambering up damp sleety slopes, the gold grass peppered white in a galaxy of fresh hailstones. With a tired grunt she hauled herself up a jagged outcrop, and turned exhausted towards the lake in hope of a view. Anything to tell her she was making progress. But there was nothing to break the monotony of the endless ancient slope, fading in the mist around her.

As she headed higher the stinging sleet became a blizzard. Breathing harder now, Tabitha blinked endlessly against the blowing snow. Hunched and squinting in the freezing gale. She sank her claws in the damp rocky turf to drag herself ever higher; a tiny dark figure on the giant slope. With the next tired reach of her hand she half-crushed something in a crevice above. It screeched an insect chirp and bit through her catsuit sleeve in defence. Tabitha yelled in shock at the sudden bloody sting, clutching her arm as the big thing scurried away.

‘Bastard!’ she yelled after it, clutching the sting as her skin healed. Sighing heavily, she shook away the burning sensation in her wrist and carried on climbing. The sun was already at its highest, from what she could tell through the dull clouds. She had to move faster; more fearlessly. Had to reach the peak before nightfall, if that was even possible. She shook her head at a sudden loss of focus, and pulled herself on up the slope.

It seemed like every other handhold slipped or rocked loose; it was hard to move quickly when no foothold felt right. Unless that was the weird tingling in her legs; what was that? Fatigue? Or the sting? Tabitha stopped on a thin rock ledge to get her strength back, and pulled the makeshift water bottle from her belt. Took a few gulps to try and stop her headache. A strong sudden gale pushed her; wobbled her precariously on the ledge. She felt her stomach turn when she almost lost her balance completely; shot out her hand to steady herself. Breathed deep, and tried not to look down where she could be falling right now. Sighing, she turned her straining eyes back to the misty slope above. Better to just carry on before the afternoon light was gone.

Just one step at a time. Swallowing down the rising nausea, Tabitha pushed herself on up the rocks. She wiped her pale sweaty face against both shoulders as she clung to the slope, ignored the sudden urge to collapse, and carried on.

She’d been climbing for a long, time now. Breaths in misted silence. Shook her head, staring wide; tried to straighten her muddled thoughts.

What... time was it? That dark now, or just her eyes? Twitching, looking up, scratching, arm stung. Venom. Heart racing; cold sweat. Thoughts twisting. The grey sky wasn’t, didn’t; nothing sense around her, spinning. Too hard; exhausted. She couldn’t, and alone. Very alone, a-and scratching, hugged to herself, had to stop it all spinning.

Fall, very steep here. Climbing, b-blinking for sight. Itching, and… dark, like dusk, but the world wasn’t. Just her. Everything, going dark. Twitching, sh-shiver, and scratching skin. Pale, sweating. Heartcore hammering, knocking her ribs to come out.

Tired. Should sleep for a bit. Yeah, sleep. Vomit and sleep. No. Stick to the... the plan. Eyes closed, world spinning, sickness rising. She’d be ok. Deep breaths. Ok... I’m, really, not ok.

Tabitha came around gasping and nauseous on the slope, terrified in the dark. It was a sudden darkness that’d crept over her. It couldn’t be night though; she still heard the mothbirds singing. Felt the sun feed her skin. But she could barely make out anything as she looked around the slope. A black-tinted window on the world, growing grimy and smudged.

‘What’s...?’ she whimpered, looking around in panic as the world faded away. Clinging to the rocks for dear life. ‘What the fuck!?’ Even just holding up her hand to her face gave her a vague moving smudge, growing darker by the second. In moments she was staring in terror at sheer nothingness, jet-black and absolute. She was blind. Gasping. Panicked. All she felt was the stinging chill of the wind and hail against her face. She pulled her hood into a helmet to seal out the cold. She had her eyes wide open; couldn’t see. All she could do was feel her way on up the slope, with hands that couldn’t touch; patting desperately for the next handhold.

It’d taken minutes to climb a couple of staggering steps. The hail wouldn’t let up. A bitter gale almost knocked her sideways, over and over again; Tabitha screamed in terror when she lost her balance and fell free. Her blind world spun; she tumbled down painfully onto a boulder on her left. Clutching the rockface for dear life, whimpering as she dragged herself up, she fumbled around blindly in the blackness. Patted around and took a handhold, and a foothold, and pulled herself back up the slope. She smacked her head hard on an overhanging ledge.

‘Fuck!’ she growled furiously, her skull smarting. Staggering to keep her footing, feeling her way around the boulders, she slipped suddenly to a grassy ledge and clung on in panic. Pebbles tumbled away below. The hail and wind were rising to a howling storm, trying to push her off the rocks.

I’ve come too far to give up now, she growled at herself stubbornly. I’m getting up this bloody mountain. Breathing deep, Tabitha gripped at the grass, and put a foot forward. Shifted her weight and slipped suddenly on smooth rock. She lost balance, toppled back screaming, and fell free. She was dropping, rolling and smacking stones; yelling blind and helpless. Tumbling endlessly down a treacherous slope which ended, very definitely, with a giant jagged rock.

Tabitha came around, and screamed in agony as her broken shoulder knitted together. Clutching herself tight, she stamped down the sobs as she got up painfully. Panic-eyed, throwing her hands out blindly around her, she felt for the lay of the rock and lifted her blood-crusted head. She stared around her in unseeing horror, as the high bitter wind whipped at her hair. When something touched her arm she yelped in terror and struck out, but found nothing. She shrank away in fright, staring blind. When she heard its deep earthy voice speak to her in alien words, she yelled and scrambled away from the shocking sound.

There’s people here? She was terrified. Had to get away. When she tripped and fell, the thing caught her.

‘Get away from me!’ she yelled, lashing out. Voice breaking in her sore dry throat. The thing left her to stumble away blindly; picked her up again firmly when she fell. Every time it picked her up, she lashed out. Missed. Every time she staggered away and stumbled on the rocky slope, it was there to pick her up again. Gentle and strong. Those same strange earthy words, slow and calm, in a deep male voice she couldn’t understand. She clambered away, breathing rapidly in her dread. She stumbled and fell; it picked her up.

‘Get away,’ she croaked at it desperately, panic-stricken. Tears streaming down her dirty cheeks. ‘Get away from me!’ They carried on their strange blind dance across the slope until Tabitha couldn’t struggle any more; the sickly venom was lead in her limbs. Those same strange words again, gentle as the tide. Slowly, gently, the thing came nearer. Tabitha huddled away and bared her claws; yelled at it. When she lashed out it gripped her wrist and shoved something in her hand. The object glugged limply like a wine skin; a leathery bottle. Shocked, nervous, thoughts turning upside down, Tabitha sat motionless like a cornered animal. She flinched in fright when the hand took her arm again, gently, and raised the limp heavy bottle to her mouth. Tabitha sniffed at it. Just water. Without thinking she gulped it until she was gasping for air; went back for more. Nothing had ever tasted sweeter. She sat blind and breathless, waiting for something to happen. Gently, a strong hand pulled the bottle slowly from hers. It muttered those same calm unknown words, like a spell. The thing came closer. Tabitha heard him sigh with old age and sit down slowly beside her. Too weak to move, she just sat there. Waiting. Listening to his old breaths next to her. He was just sitting there too, silent. Drinking his water.

‘...Thank you,’ Tabitha said at last, wiping water drops off her chin where they grew icy cold in the wind. Staring dead ahead into nothing on the misty slope. Startled, she felt him take her wrist again and push something into her hand. A wad of leaves, from the sound of it. The creature uttered a single gruff word. Taking her wrist gently again, he coaxed her hand to her mouth. Wary, Tabitha resisted at first. More calm words from the stranger. Alien, but soft and reassuring. Tabitha plucked uncertainly at the rustling wad in her palm, and pushed a tight pinch of it into her mouth. No sound from her new companion. She chewed on the dry tangled leaves; gagged at the bitter taste like soily sprouts. He laughed gently and agreed with her, in whatever language that was. Tabitha sat and chewed the leaves for a few minutes, clutching her head at the aching sickness. Just hoped that chewing something solid wouldn’t make her throw up.

Slowly, her leaden nauseous feeling faded. She could even face sitting upright, without that sharp poison cramping in her muscles.

‘I feel better. Thank you,’ she said cautiously, croakily. Her companion grunted his approval and hoisted himself up, sighing with the effort. A gruff gentle word, and Tabitha felt his hand close around her wrist. Pulling at her arm. Helping her up. When she turned to find her next foothold in the rock to hoist herself upwards, the stranger’s grip tightened on her arm. Pulling her away from the climb with warning words.

‘I need to get to the top,’ she told him, trying to ease her arm away from his grip. The stranger chuckled alien words and coaxed her back. She didn’t need to guess what he meant. Don’t be stupid.

‘I know, but I need to get to my friends,’ she explained, tapping her heart and pointing to the summit, in the hopes that’d go some way to translating her intent. The stranger just repeated the same alien words though, deep and reassuring. When the sickness rose up in her again and dropped her to her knees heaving, he rubbed her back strongly and helped her up. Ok, so maybe he had a point.

‘Can you help me back up here, when I’m better?’ she tried, as the stranger led her on down the grassy slope. He said something dismissively; he didn’t understand.

Blind to the world, Tabitha let the stranger guide her carefully down the mountainside. He was grunting and steering ahead of her, so she wouldn’t lose her footing. Leading her, down and down, as calm and gentle as if she was a child. For once, Tabitha let herself be led. For the first time in so long, someone had reached out to her without trying to hurt her. Despite her shock and blind panic and sore sickly stomach, and her aching limbs that wanted to give up on her… despite the nagging doubt in the back of her mind… she even allowed herself to feel safe. The stranger led her on by the hand in steady silence, right back through the forest; there was only the rustling rhythm of their footsteps.

Eventually the trees and twigs beneath Tabitha’s feet gave way to thin grass and soft whispering soil. The fresh breeze felt stronger here; now they were walking on smooth clacking stones. She could make out the sound of lapping water, fizzing through pebbles and grit. Her guide had led her all the way back to the lake. Taking her hand to walk on with her, the stranger grunted, and helped her step in among big rocks. Pulling gently at her wrist, he manoeuvred her hand until it clinked against something in front of her. Patting blindly at the shape of it, she realised it was her glass bowl. He’d brought her back to her camp.

‘I know you won’t understand this, but thank you, so much,’ she said shakily, taking the stranger’s hands in hers. Smiling to him blindly. When he shook her hands awkwardly and chuckled in return, Tabitha grinned. He led her up a familiar slope until her reaching hand bumped against a rocky crevice. Her nest. She practically collapsed from her ordeal, now she was back home. Laying a strong leathery hand on top of her head, the stranger made sure she didn’t collide blindly with the rocky ceiling as she crawled inside. Her messy bed of leaves and moss had never felt so welcoming. The moment she sat down sighing, she heard the stranger speak softly and walk away.

‘Don’t go!’ she said desperately, reaching out for him, crawling out from the crevice with all the strength she had left. She reached toward the stranger at the crevice opening, and heard him come back. He muttered strange gruff words she didn’t understand, and took her hand and patted her arm reassuringly. The word he repeated meant nothing to her, but he emphasised it by guiding her gently back into the crevice. He was leaving; she had to stay put. The old man placed another rustling clump of dry leaves in her hand, spoke again, and walked away.

‘Don’t go,’ Tabitha said quietly, sadly, as she huddled in the crevice entrance. She wished she had the strength to crawl back out and follow him, but her limbs were dead weights. Listening blindly for the stranger’s fading footsteps, she heard him walk off into the forest.

11

On a far-flung ocean world, a starving eight-foot creature mined the sea bed in the vast dark deep. A ton of muscle, fish-scaled in black and white spiral stripes; a mane of thick crimson fins. He floated up exhausted from his day’s work to study the deep for predators; gills straining for water as he fought to catch his breath. Tried to ignore the twisting pull of lifelong hunger in his stomach. As the swirling sand cleared from his secret dig site, something white gleamed under the light of his lantern. Maybe his family could eat this week after all. He dived back at the rockface in a starving frenzy, chiselling away at the rock until his back stung and his arms burned and he’d dug up the biggest crystal he’d ever seen. It was his family’s hospital bill and retirement plan; a ticket away from all the back-breaking work and endless hunger down here in the Sand Flats. Their ticket to paradise. Gasping for breath, muscles aching, the creature glanced around and hurriedly stuffed the crystal into the sack on his belt. Hearts pounding up in his mouth, he swept the drifting sand back in to cover the hole in the rockface. With one last cautious look over his shoulders, he swam off for the long quiet way home.

‘Open the bag,’ a city guard ordered him in grumbling sonar, swimming up beside him. Making sure he saw the sparkspear in his webbed hands.

‘Come on brother, I need to get home. My mother’s sick,’ the creature replied in apology, trying to swim on. He felt the sparkspear in his side.

‘I said, open the bag,’ the guard growled, moving the spear to the creature’s throat.

‘Please, brother,’ the creature pleaded. ‘I’ve got sick parents to feed. You understand. Do it for the good of Shoalbond, yeah?’

‘Shoalbond doesn’t put food in my family’s mouths,’ the guard replied, with a smug fish-lipped smile. ‘That’s the Ministry’s job. Open the bag. Last chance.’

‘You’re a bastard, do you know that?’ the creature replied, his big shoulders dropping.

‘I’m a bastard with a Ministry paycheck,’ the guard replied. ‘Open it. Now.’ Slowly, reluctantly, feeling the lethal sparkspear up against his throat, the creature pulled up the sack from his belt and opened it to reveal a fortune of crystal. The fortune that would’ve bought his sick parents a rest home on Coral Rise, under the sparkling sunlight, far from the belching chimneys here on the Sand Flats. Far from the fumes that’d killed so many before them, down here where the real food didn’t live any more.

‘Oh shit,’ the guard mumbled, staring at the crystal’s sheer size. ‘Hard luck, brother,’ he said smugly, taking the sack. ‘Ministry property now.’

‘My little sister’s dying,’ the creature pleaded, opening up his rawest nerve. ‘Come on brother. She’s six.’

‘Every bastard’s got someone dying,’ the guard replied, snatching the crystal away. ‘It’s the Sand Flats. Word of advice – if you want to help your dying family, don’t get caught next time. Now fuck off.’

‘You’re killing my family,’ the creature replied desperately, his fish eyes darting between the guard’s and the crystal. ‘Break off a piece for me, how about that? Break off a piece for yourself. Just leave me something to buy some food, for fuck’s sake.’

‘Ministry property,’ the guard grinned back. ‘Now move along.’ People swimming back from the mines were beginning to stare.

‘Come on, just break me off a piece,’ the creature urged him. ‘Keep the rest, I don’t care. Just give me something to feed my family.’

‘Fuck. Off,’ the guard replied impatiently, poking his spear into the creature’s throat again. The growing crowd was making him edgy.

‘We haven’t eaten in days,’ the creature pleaded, staring with a sudden intensity. Trying to reach for it. Trying desperately to keep his anger in check. ‘I need that to take care of my family!’ he bellowed furiously. ‘You’ve got no right!’

‘I said fuck off!’ the guard yelled back, jabbing him with the spear. The creature looked down at the blue blood puffing aquatic from his stomach, and flipped. Grabbed the spear from the guard’s hands and struck out. The guard looked at him in sudden shock, gills gasping for breath. Stuck through with his own sparking spear. The creature watched in horror as the guard fell limp and drifted down dead in the churning sand. Stared in shock.

For the love of Shoalbond, what have I done? Already the shouting crowd was bustling in to grab the killer and pin him down. Already, his shoalbrothers and shoalsisters began to fight and claw over the million-credit crystal lying in the sand at his feet. He fought with every ounce of starving animal anger in his body, and still the crowd grabbed and pulled and pinned him down in the floating sand. As more guards hurried out from the city, the creature knew what was coming next. His was a crime worthy of exile to the shallows. A long hot death in the searing sun, gasping for breath in a foot of water while his body cooked – and not just him. He’d have to watch his family succumb to the same fate first; anything to thin the population these days. He’d sentenced them to death, and his starving fanatical shoalbrothers and sisters would make sure the sentence was carried out. All for the faded glory of Shoalbond… and the grinning, grabbing Ministry corporations that had sprung up in its place.

12

Tabitha woke up cold and bleary-eyed, and rustled down deeper in her bed of leaves. Breathed deep. Blinking drowsily, she studied the cracks of daylight in the bamboo wall beside her, and realised she could see. Smiling, eyes watering, she cried quietly with her hands over her face. She’d never felt so relieved in her life, as this cold single moment in her nest.

She had the stranger to thank, but he was nowhere in sight when she crawled outside. It was a wonder just to see where she was going again, as she climbed down the boulders to her campfire. Easing down stiffly with sore muscles, she took her seat on the flattest rock and sparked a fire. Fed sticks to the flames and took a moment to flick her claws out, rubbing the soil off them from her climb. Tutting at the dirt, she polished them with a scrap of squidlizard skin; sharpened them on her hard palms where they’d regrown too rough. A primal manicure.

The wind was up today; there was a strange herby smell. Boiling up water in the glass bowl, Tabitha wondered at something and followed her nose around the rocks.

‘That,’ she said, sipping her tea, ‘Is really weird.’ It wasn’t a bad taste; the gold herbs she’d sniffed out and steeped were actually kind of refreshing. Nowhere near as bitter as the dried leaves the stranger had given her to chew. She blew her cup and sipped it by the crackling fire, watching the steely lake reflect the daylight.

‘Basil?’ she told no one, smacking her lips to work out the flavour. Weird taste for a tea. Still, it made a change from water. Draining her cup, she hugged herself against the cold and wondered if the old man was going to come back. She couldn’t believe there’d been people here, all this time; an alien race. Tabitha shot upright when she realised there was something moving close by. She heard sniffing beyond the boulders, and a smell like dog. Wary, she flicked her claws out and crept around the big rocks. There at the foot of the nest stood an old newtish marsupial, brown-furred and stockier than a human, dressed in pelts and bones. Watching her with frost-blue eyes.

Is that...? Tabitha wondered. Watching nervously, she heard him grunt and speak. Recognised his earthy old voice.

‘You’re back!’ Tabitha said happily, clambering over the rocks, her face lighting up with a grin. He smiled warmly and met her by the shore; she shook his rough old hand in both of hers.

‘Thank you, for everything,’ she told him, hand on heart as she smiled to him. Wanted to make it clear what she meant. ‘You saved my life.’ He smiled a creased old grin, and muttered something back. You’re welcome. Tabitha was surprised at how well she could understand him, now she saw his expressions; even without knowing his words. Body language spoke louder than she’d thought.

The old man followed Tabitha’s lead when she sat by the dying fire. Silently, he sat down opposite, with the campfire’s small stone circle between them; the winter wind ruffling his dull brown fur. Was he smiling? Or was that just how his wide mouth looked?

‘Want to see a magic trick?’ Tabitha said happily, taking a damp stick in her hands. The strange canine newtsupial watched intently as she stared at the stick, clutching it tighter. Tabitha focussed her thoughts and pushed current along her arm to her hand. The stick was smoking; burning. Her new friend grunted in shock and staggered up as quickly as he could. He looked frightened.

‘It’s not that scary, is it?’ she said, putting the smouldering stick into a tuft of tinder. ‘Come on, sit down. I’ll make you some tea.’ The old man stared at the growing flames, trying to work out if they were real; wondering how they’d come straight from her hands like that. He watched intently as she boiled the water and dropped the gold herbs in to steep; the first time he’d ever seen such a thing.

‘It’s hot,’ she told him, as she handed him a burned bamboo cup. ‘You’ll have to blow it.’ She filled a cup for herself and blew on the steaming water to show him. Following her lead, he blew and took a sip. His cold eyes grew wide at the taste; he grunted a chuckle to her. Muttered earthy words in pleasant surprise.

‘It’s alright, isn’t it?’ Tabitha said warmly, watching him blow and slurp a second mouthful of tea. She hadn’t felt this satisfied in ages, just to sit with someone in peace; not since the castle really, now she thought about it. It didn’t really matter that they couldn’t talk to each other; it just felt nice not to be alone.

They sat by the fire in silence for a little while, sipping their tea, watching the clouds drift slowly over the mountains. Listening to the bitter wind hiss in the trees, and the lake tide lapping. Tabitha saw that he had his eyes shut to listen, like he was meditating or something. She put her empty cup down on the rocks as quietly as she could; it dropped with a wooden knock. The old man looked around at the sound.

‘Sorry,’ she whispered reverently, as if she’d disturbed a spell. She watched him watching her in silence; wondered what he was thinking.

The old man watched the red-maned creature for a moment; studied her scaly black coat that wasn’t her coat at all. She was wearing the skin of something else, just like they did in the winter. Looked like she’d patched it up with dog skin, too. So it was her who’d killed half the pack further round the shore. He’d mourned their loss deeply when he’d found them; prayed to the ancestors to guide their spirits swiftly to new growth in the worms and seeds. Who was this strange woman, to come here and take so much life so wastefully? She didn’t seem ill-willed. A lost spirit, maybe. Confused and unfamiliar with this world. Where had she come from? Maybe she was learning her first steps, like a child. A child who needed help and guidance.

Tabitha watched the old man stare intently, nodding his head. He pointed a clawed finger at her and rubbed his chest. Grunted words; pointed to her. At first she was confused by the action, and stared at him pale and shivering. Until she realised what he was telling her.

Keep your chest warm, he said wordlessly; miming the actions. Hugging himself tight around the ribs and pointing to her. Standing up, he wriggled out of the coarse fur vest he was wearing and offered it to her.

‘What about you? Won’t you be cold?’ she asked him. She didn’t know why; he was covered in fur anyway. She was already tempted to make a selfish grab for the vest regardless of courtesy, it was so cold today. The old man simply shook his head and smiled his dog-toothed grin, and pushed the fur vest into her hands. It was a tight fit when she pulled it on over her catsuit; she felt her torso warming like an oven.

‘This is brilliant, thank you,’ she told him happily, trying to put as much feeling into her eyes and tone as she could, so her gratitude came across. His old eyes softened into a smile, and he patted her hand with a leathery palm. He was pointing to something else now; he wanted to see the knife on her belt. He took it from her and studied it closely, holding its cloudy glass blade up to the sunlight. He explained with a series of gruff mutters and finger-points that the blade was too short and bad quality, or a bad grain ran through it. He added that the bark grip was poor, and how it peeled off easily.

‘How do you make them?’ Tabitha asked him, pointing a finger to him. He muttered gruff words and produced a glass machete, worn horizontally on the back of his belt. A million miles from her own crappy effort. He handed it to her in silence.

‘It’s beautiful,’ Tabitha replied, studying the curved engravings along the blade, inlaid with black pitch to stand out. The handle was heavily wrapped in dark sandpapery strips; the old blade smoothed and sharpened so thoroughly that it could’ve sliced through a dictionary.

‘Can you teach me how to make one?’ Tabitha asked him, studying the heavy ornate blade before she handed it back.

Wandering the forest with her, the old man took on a different mood when they found the right patch of glass rocks. He didn’t respond to her questions; hissed at her to be quiet.

‘Sorry,’ she said respectfully, feeling a sense of ritual here. The old man cut rustling branches nearby and sharpened them to flat stakes. He pushed them into fault lines in a glass boulder and hammered them in with a stone. Taking his water skin, he soaked the stakes until they swelled. Slowly, a piece of flawless glass like a short plank split away with an icy crack. He nodded silently to Tabitha to pull it from its place, and set her to work on the shore.

She quickly learned the right and wrong way to chip the slab into shape; every time she struck it wrong with her stone the old man prodded her painfully with a finger in the ribs. He slapped the glass with a rough palm in the right place to strike it, and jabbed her again to do it.

‘You can just tell me I’m getting it wrong,’ Tabitha grumbled moodily, after a dozen pokes in her bruised ribs. He hissed at her to be quiet and carry on.

How long had she been chipping this bloody glass now? Her numb bumcheeks told her it’d been hours. But her teacher was relentless in his silent instruction. Equally diligent with his finger pokes in her sore ribs. He grunted and snatched the blade off her suddenly, and tried his damnedest to break it in his hands.

‘If you snap that I’m going to beat the crap out of you,’ she told him grumpily. ‘I’ve spent too long on that to–

The old man hissed at her to be quiet. He gave up trying to break the rough blade and handed it back. Tabitha watched him expectantly. Searching the shore, he tossed her a dense dark rock like a whetstone. He sat down beside her and showed her how to chip skinny notches to thin the blade out, and grate the rough sides smooth.

He watched her like a hawk as she chipped the blade thinner. Eventually he grunted his approval and rinsed off the sparkling glassdust in the lake, then showed her how to angle the blade and run it diagonally across the stone. Tabitha kept on until she got an eventual grunt of approval. Smiling, she studied her sharp clear blade in the sunlight.

She wasn’t quite so pleased about what came next. The old man led her down the shore to where the fishpenguins nested; he grabbed a slow one before it could escape and shoved it struggling and gump-gumping into her hands. He motioned to her to grab its head and twist it. To clutch its struggling feet and pull them the other way.

‘I can’t,’ she mumbled, horrified, as the thing struggled in her grip. Her new friend emphasised that that was what she had to do. Killing giant spiders, fine, she thought. But this thing looks like a cartoon character.

‘Oh god,’ she said, looking away guiltily as she gripped its frantic squabbling head. Twisting. Pulling. Harder. Cringing at the deed. With one sudden shuddering tug, she’d snapped its neck. The thing fell limp in her hands.

‘God,’ she mumbled in shock, as the old man took it from her and skinned it. He scrubbed the skin in the lake with a soft chalky stone, handed it to her floppy and dripping, and carried its skinned body back to camp.

‘Sorry,’ Tabitha mumbled miserably to her kill, staring at the dripping skin in her hand as she wandered back.

At least the poor bugger wasn’t going to waste. Roasting it on the crackling fire, the old man wolfed it down happily. He offered some to Tabitha redundantly several times.

‘Sorry, I can’t eat,’ she tried to explain, though right now she really wished she could. The rich fishpoultry scent of that roasted meat was the best smell she could remember, especially in this cold winter air. Watching her new friend pick the steaming meat contentedly, gnawing the bones and crunching gristle... it was torture. When he squeezed the crap from its guts though, and roasted them on a stick to eat them too, she found her appetite magically fading away.

‘Hm,’ he grunted, chewing liver; pointing at the dark wet skin beside her. Telling her to hang it over the fire.

‘Won’t it cook?’ she said, dangling it from a stick over the flames. He just grunted that it’d be fine, and to let it steam and dry out.

Once he was satisfied that the scaly skin was tough enough, he had her cut it into long rubbery strips and bind the handle of her new knife. He tied the grippy binding off for her, when he saw her thick black fingers couldn’t manage it, and presented her new weapon.

‘It’s beautiful, thank you,’ Tabitha replied, trying to sound as respectful as she could. Samurai movies in her head. She reached for it slowly, reverently, with both hands. ‘It’s an honour to–

He hissed at her to shut up and take it, and shoved it in her hand. Chuckling as he patted her shoulder. They shared a smile. Looking down at the knife in that moment, wondering about the old man and his way of life, a thought crept into her head. That maybe she’d found what she was looking for, when she’d set out into the stars; even if just a glimpse. That single, sacred idea. The tribe.

13

Tabitha built up the fire afresh and boiled some tea. The fabric of her catsuit was healing; she could feel it. Taking in the sunlight, growing back minutely but constantly, like a plant. The old man sat restfully on a flat rock nearby, carving rough curled patterns into her knife blade; inlaying them carefully with trickling black pitch. Muttering quiet chants as he worked.

Tabitha passed him a cup of tea, watching him finish his rough-fingered work with hypnotic interest. But she couldn’t just keep thinking of him as the old man.

‘Do you have a name?’ she asked him, as she sipped her steaming tea. He only gave her a quizzical look when he glanced up from the flames.

‘I’m Tabitha,’ she said, tapping her fingertips to her breastbone. ‘Tabitha. What’s your name?’ she said, pointing a finger at him. He tapped his fingers on his chest in response. He barked a gruff growling word that she could never hope to repeat, pronounced with deep rough sounds, like a bass guitar tossed in a woodchipper. Tabitha tried to say the word back to him and failed miserably; shrugged and shook her head. The old man smiled and got to his feet, and waved her on to follow him. Crouching down by a towering pine, he slapped a leathery old hand on the bare roots. Tabitha watched in fascination as he clawed and dug the soil away, deep down into the damp ground. He tapped a finger on the root he’d exposed, and slapped his palm against it very definitely. Pointed down at the soil, and spread his fingers wide like more roots, going way down deep.

‘Deep Roots? That’s your name?’ said Tabitha, moving her hands as if they were delving deep into the ground. The old man didn’t understand her words, but he could see the comprehension on her face. He nodded and grinned.

‘Kah v’ha,’ he grunted in his gravelly voice, with an old smile.

‘Kah v’ha?’ she asked him, as they wandered back to the campfire. ‘What does that mean?’ she made her uncertainty obvious in her expression; it was all the interpretation they had to work with.

‘Kav, v’ha,’ he said again happily, pointing at her. He was saying her name.

‘Oh, right!’ she replied, smiling. ‘Tab, i, tha,’ she told him slowly, tapping her fingertips to her chest.

‘Khhaav, i, vvvhaa,’ he replied carefully, trying to wrap his jaw around the alien sounds. ‘Khav v’hah.’

‘Close enough,’ she told him warmly. ‘Can I just call you Deep Roots?’ she said, pointing to him. He nodded gladly, then repeated Kah V’ha and shrugged. He didn’t understand her name either.

‘It used to mean gazelle, like a deer,’ she told him. She glanced around for one of the deer-looking animals she’d seen grazing now and then, hopefully conveniently placed in the near distance for her to point to. Not so much. Instead she searched the shore for a chalky-looking stone. Deep Roots watched in fascination as she outlined a crude deer sketch on the rock wall, in pale chalk. When she stood back from her cave drawing, and pointed to herself, he grunted his understanding happily.

Learning that they could both draw was something of a revelation. Within minutes they’d filled the rock face with a happy mess of animals, stick figures and stars. Deep Roots explained that this place was the Stormworld, and that beyond it was the spirit land, where all life came from, and returned to, and came from again. He grunted gruff words in his native Stormish that she couldn’t even hope to pronounce, let alone understand.

Through a complex series of chalk illustrations Tabitha tried to explain that she’d come from a far distant world, Earth, which had been taken by tall invaders from another planet, who’d killed her race. She’d travelled across the great starry divide of space with her friend Fishbowl in her living ship, a dragon, and now she’d lost them and was trying to find them. She was pretty sure that they’d gone to investigate the bright light on the mountain across the lake, she explained, but they hadn’t returned. When Tabitha stepped back to study her scruffy mural, suddenly this all seemed exactly like the ravings of a madwoman.

Studying Deer’s rock drawings to piece it all together, Deep Roots understood now. Or some of it, at least. Deer believed that she and her people had come from a great round seed, Urth. There was a race of giants or demons, tall and thin; a shorter race too, and they’d gone to war and many had died. One night, as Deer had lain staring up at the stars to pray for peace, or possibly escape, a great sacred bird spirit had carried her away into a dream, and she’d woken up here in this far land. With Deer’s prayer answered, the great bird spirit had flown back up to the peak of Sacred Mountain across the lake, and returned into the holy white light to the spirit land. The more Deep Roots thought about Deer’s story, the more it made perfect sense. There were a great many spirits in this world; many of his people’s greatest ancestors had become bird spirits after death. He’d never seen a bird spirit big enough to carry a person across the stars, but then again the spirit land was full of wonders that no mortal could know. Taking up a piece of chalk to draw, he explained to Deer that he was glad she was here, that he was grateful for her friendship, and that one day he hoped very much to see this great bird spirit for himself.

Tabitha watched Deep Roots drawing, and smiling to her; trying to explain the pictures in his gruff growly voice. Tabitha studied the drawings for a moment, and thought she understood what he was trying to say. She hugged him happily. It was then that she realised that the mud crusted deep in his fur wasn’t mud at all. It smelled like iron; it was dried blood. When she let go and looked him in the eyes, she realised her hug had hurt him.

‘What did this to you?’ she asked him, looking into his pale blue eyes with concern. The old man looked away and waved his hand to dismiss her.

It doesn’t matter, he seemed to say. But Tabitha wasn’t about to let it go that easily. Picking up the chalky stone again, she drew the closest thing she could manage to the pantherwolf on the rock wall.

‘Did the pantherwolf do this to you?’ she asked him, pointing to the picture. Deep Roots shook his head quickly and said nothing; just sat down and stared across the lake. Tabitha scrawled away again, the chalky stone rasping and crumbling in the wintry silence.

‘Or these?’ she asked him, pointing to her quick scribble of the squidlizards. Again, Deep Roots looked at the pictures and turned away. Clearly he didn’t like these questions, but she had to know what’d hurt him. Not the squidlizards, or the pantherwolf, and she hadn’t seen any man-eating mothbirds on her travels... what else could’ve hurt him like this?

‘Wait... did your own kind do this to you?’ she asked him in concern. Turning back to the rock wall, Tabitha sketched a silhouette like him. Deep Roots glanced at the drawing, his eyes lingering a little too long before he looked away. He said nothing; made no sign. Dented pride.

‘That’s why you came to see me again, to get away from them,’ she said quietly, coming to sit beside him where he watched the lapping tide. He glanced at her, and patted her hand to comfort her when he saw how upset she was. ‘No... it’s because of me,’ she realised, with creeping guilt. ‘Because I’m an outsider... and you helped me down the mountain.’ Before she could press the point, Deep Roots stood up and took hold of her hand, leading her down to the lakeshore. He wanted to show her something.

‘What’re you looking for?’ she asked him with concern, watching closely as he studied the shore. ‘Is it tracks? Is something hunting us?’ but Deep Roots made no reply. Brow furrowed, he studied the shore as if his life depended on it. Pacing along beside the gentle tide, staring at the ground with absolute concentration. Tabitha followed, watching in fascination. What was he doing? Just then he stopped, stooped down, and picked up a pebble. He turned to show her with a proud sharp grin, moving the smooth flat stone around in his fingers. Tabitha was puzzled, until he turned back to the lake and promptly skimmed the stone out over the water. He looked back at her with a proud air, and held up eight rough fingers to count his pebble’s bounces over the water. He opened his arms out to challenge her, and grinned his wide smile. Cold, pale, tired and homesick, Tabitha suddenly burst out laughing.

‘Oh, it is so on,’ she told him happily, searching the pebbles for the finest skimmer she could find. Her first throw was pathetic; it barely cleared the shallows and sank with a sorry glug. Deep Roots laughed his weird alien bark at her, shaking his head in despair as he plucked another pebble from the shore. He hunched up, studied the lake carefully, and tossed a solid six over the cold still water. Not to be defeated, Tabitha hurriedly searched for another stone and put everything she had behind the throw. Seven rippling bounces across the lake.

‘Boom!’ she called back, stepping up to him while he laughed. ‘You’re going down, old man. You are going down.’ As Deep Roots crouched to find his next stone a sudden barking yell echoed up from the deep forest, angry and fierce. Tabitha jumped and turned in shock. Deep Roots sprang to his feet in terror, and urged her to hide. He ran for the trees as fast as he could.

‘Wait!’ Tabitha called out, trying to run after him. ‘I can protect you!’ she chased him desperately, watching him disappear into the forest. She couldn’t keep up; the large pebbles on the shore were near impossible to run on. Every other footstep staggered her, or jerked her ankles on the tumbling rocks.

‘Deep Roots, wait!’ she yelled after him, watching the silent tree line hiss and ripple in the wind. He’d gone.

14

Tabitha wasn’t about to give up on Deep Roots so easily. If he was in danger from his own people then she had to find him. Protect him. Especially since she was the reason they were hurting him. She followed the direction he’d run into the forest, hurtling past walls of clustered bamboo that blurred by all around her. Desperately trying to follow a straight line between the trees so she didn’t lose her way.

Sprinted out, gasping for breath, she slowed to a walk and clutched her hands behind her head in exhaustion. Shook out the acid ache in her legs. She’d lost him; now she was starting to think she’d gotten herself lost too. It was impossible to tell how far she’d run through the forest, or what direction she’d come from; there were no points of reference. Just a rustling sea of bamboo. Looking up, a galaxy of dull gold leaves rustled high above her, blocking a clear view of the sky. What little she could see was covered with white cloud. Hard to navigate with the sun if she couldn’t find it. She was lost.

‘Ok, don’t panic,’ she whispered to herself, and promptly began to panic. The most logical thing to do was look for her own footprints, and follow them back the way she’d come. Except... she couldn’t see them anywhere. The forest floor wasn’t a convenient stretch of bare soil; it was an endless carpet of rocks and roots and blowing dead leaves. Breathing deep, trying to keep calm, she took her best guess at the direction for the lake and set off into the forest.

Cold and exhausted, she scrambled on through a patch of mossy rocks, to a sloping stone outcrop where she could look down on the forest around her. Studying the far ground where the undergrowth thinned out, and the pointed crag in the far distance, she realised where she’d walked back to.

Yeah, it was risky to follow the pantherwolf’s hunting track. But as long as she was quick, and quiet, it’d lead her straight back to the lakeshore before nightfall. She really didn’t want to be out here come nightfall. Something caught her eye then; if she hadn’t been watching the ground she would’ve walked right past it. A gnarled little plant, black and twisted; the strange vine that’d leeched her blood. She’d ripped it off her leg and tossed it down in horror. But it looked so different now; dark and otherworldly. Distinctly more Watcher-like, like her hands and feet. It seemed to have grown in one last desperate twist towards the sunlight before it’d given up. Staring silently, Tabitha crouched to pick it up. Realised when it resisted that it’d taken root again. She plucked it from the soil with a snap and recognised the same angular grain through it, like her fingerprints. She’d mutated it; her blood had changed it. It flinched. Fascinated, she stuffed the plant in her belt. But there was something a little more pressing right now; the daylight was fading. She had to get back before nightfall.

‘I hate this planet,’ Tabitha mumbled, dragging her tired feet through endless dead leaves. The short winter days here crept by quickly; the gloom was thickening to black night. She scoured the forest floor for a dry piece of wood, before it got too dark to make anything out. Snapping a long branch in half with a crack that was far too loud, she wrapped the end in a big lump of gummy tree resin to make a torch, and lit it with a clump of burning moss in her hand. The sudden light of the torch hurt her eyes; dripping flame as she cast its smoky flickering glow on the forest around her. A few feet behind, she glimpsed a shining dot reflecting the light. A giant black spectre. Her breath caught in her throat. The pantherwolf leapt on her. Screaming, terrified, torch dropped down, Tabitha stuffed her hand between its sharp snarling teeth before they could clamp round her throat. Its huge hot steaming breaths filled her head; that rushing noise and deathly stench. Its giant jaws clattered redundantly on her armoured hand; the force of its attack pushed her backwards along the forest floor as she struggled with it. Clawing at its eye until it snarled and flinched away, Tabitha staggered to her feet to run. Heartcore pounding, she grabbed up the torch. Spun and screamed and beat the bastard hard around the head in a flurry of wooden thumps and glowing embers. The pantherwolf snarled at the flames and leapt back in fright. Tabitha pulled the glass knife from her belt. When it came at her again she stabbed it twice and tried to scramble behind it before it tackled her to the ground. She screamed when it bit down on her forearm, breaking the bone with a dull crack. Yelling in agony, flooded with adrenalin, Tabitha stabbed viciously at its head until it let go. Scrambled to her feet and tried to run. It bounded after her and crushed her against the ground, biting her metal hands as she covered her head. The animal bit into her arm and dragged her screaming, wrenching at her until she felt the limb straining in its socket. Her mind switched off in primal panic. She clawed its snout rabidly, yelling and screaming as it crushed her chest with a paw and tried to kill her. She grabbed its huge wrinkled snout as it tried to snap its jaws around her skull. Shot it with a crackling burst of voltage in a flurry of sparks, drove it back, and looked in stunned shock at what she’d done. The pantherwolf prowled away in fright, cold eyes wide and snarling murder. Drunk on fury Tabitha ran at it, dodged its swipe and clamped her clawed hands on its huge head. Shotgunned voltage into its skull with a scream until it shook and cowered away with a frightened roar. With one last ghostly snarl, it disappeared into the night.

‘I’ll fucking kill you!’ Tabitha screamed furiously. Heartcore pounding, the smell of burning fur filled her head in the black forest. Grabbing up her flickering torch in desperation, she searched around her for any sign of it lurking. She was bleeding out; breathing hard in the sudden silence. It was gone. Tabitha fell to her knees to get her breath back. It was only when her adrenalin died down that she realised how bad her wounds were. Her arms and legs were covered in huge toothmarks; deep silver-glistening punctures in her flesh. Cradling her broken arm as it healed, holding in her panicked sobs, Tabitha stamped down her terror and dragged herself to her feet. Clamped her hands around the biggest gouge in her thigh and forced the bleeding flesh back together, pushing a string of hissing curses through gritted teeth.

‘I’ll find you,’ she snarled at the silent forest, and the pantherwolf that lurked out there. ‘I’ll cut your fucking heart out, I swear!’ she screamed. Limping over to where her glass knife glistened among dead leaves, she tucked it back into her belt. Wiping a muddy palm against her catsuit, she clamped her hand tight around the streaming teethmarks in her forearm.

‘Fuck!’ she gasped, doubled over, feeling the broken bone move with a sickening agony. Tightening her grip, eyes watering and sickness rising, she felt the halves of bone snap back against each other. Screamed like all hell into the silent forest, and fell to her knees as the sound echoed out. She was blacking out.

Breathe deep. Breathe. Handle it. No one else was going to save her. It was all on her to stop being so weak. Sobbing at the pain, fighting to stay conscious, Tabitha wiped her tears angrily and dragged herself up. The flesh and bone would knit; she had to keep moving. Had to get back to camp. Raising her torch, she limped off for the lake.

Tabitha fed sticks to her campfire, huddled up against the howling wind by the shore. She sat up; couldn’t sleep. The fire danced in her gold eyes; its orange glow lit her like a tiny ghost in a world of winter black. She missed Seven and Fishbowl. Missed Earth, or what was left of it. God, it’s hard here. It’s just so hard.

‘Don’t cry,’ she snapped at herself angrily. ‘Don’t you dare fucking cry. Weak.’ Pulling the glass knife from her belt, she took a sharp stone and began chipping small notches in the blade. Serrating the edge for the next time she met the pantherwolf, and she would. She knew it. They wouldn’t stop fighting until one of them was dead.

‘Weak,’ she spat, berating herself, eyes fixed on her work. ‘Weak.’ She repeated it like a mantra, sharpening her knife in the freezing dark.

15

‘Arch Minister,’ the winter figure said plaintively, rushing through the gleaming hospital ward in Serenity’s Capital City. ‘I came as soon as I heard.’

‘You didn’t need to rush over here for the sake of an old man, First Minister,’ the aged creature said weakly, straining as he sat up in the high-backed chair beside his hospital bed. Hit with a shaky coughing fit from his crackling words. The androgynous winter figure merely smiled sympathetically; its pale eyes full of compassion.

‘This is the fifth interworld council I’ve missed now. Fifth in a row,’ said the old Arch Minister, straining for breath as he tried to get comfortable in the chair. ‘And countless meetings and addresses, of course.’ Another coughing fit. ‘There’s nothing so unseemly as frail and absent leadership, you know,’ the old man continued. ‘...Which is why I’ve decided to make arrangements, for a shortlist of my successors,’ he continued, with sad stern resignation. Watching the bright gorgeous world through walls of glass. ‘Perhaps it’s time I thought about retirement.’

‘Don’t talk like this, Arch Minister,’ the winter figure urged him, setting a chair down to sit beside him. ‘We’ve brought together the best doctors in the federation to discuss your case in-depth. We’ll have you back in the Grand Hall in no time.’ A hospital orderly entered silently then, setting down a fine steaming meal beside the Arch Minister’s varied medicines and supplements. The regal old creature eyed his lunch resentfully, devoid of appetite. The winter figure watched him dismiss the free meal and hated him intensely in that moment, secretly and silently, smiling sympathetically all the while. It thought back to a dark, angry, lonely time, when its own young starving body had begun to eat itself. Same planet. Different worlds.

‘Please try to eat something today, Arch Minister,’ the winter figure advised him gently; eyes full of fresh concern. ‘You’re in all our prayers. Daily.’ The old man coughed and beckoned the winter figure closer, with a hooked ancient finger.

‘When you joined the council I thought you were a jumped-up little shit,’ the old man confided. The winter figure laughed at that, full and genuine; surprised by his bluntness. ‘And every day, every year that followed, you’ve worked harder than anyone I’ve ever met to prove me wrong.’

‘Thank you, Arch Minister,’ the winter figure replied sincerely. ‘I take great pleasure in my work.’

‘And it shows in what you’ve achieved for this government,’ the old man replied, nodding, taking up his cutlery with frail stricken hands. ‘Which is why I’m putting you at the top of my list of successors, when the time comes.’

About fucking time. ‘I... don’t know what to say, Arch Minister,’ the winter figure replied in fake shock, stumbling on its words. It blinked a quick proud shining tear, to prove its sincerity. These soft emotional species do love tears.

‘Say nothing,’ the Arch Minister replied, with a lofty sacred air, as if his every word was being written down for posterity. ‘Merely continue the good work which has earned it.’

‘I serve the united worlds,’ the winter figure replied simply, dutifully, as it stood up. The old man loves all that sentimental shit. ‘But I’ll leave you to eat in peace, Arch Minister,’ the winter figure stammered, bowing awkwardly and unpractised. Just like it’d practised, night after night, for that honest bumbling bootstrap authenticity the voters loved. ‘Again, my eternal gratitude for your decision. If that is your wish.’

‘Give my apologies to the Grand Council, again,’ the old Arch Minister sighed, nodding the winter figure away as he cut into his food. ‘And First Minister... you’re a good man.’ The winter figure merely smiled humbly and bowed its head, and took its leave.

Test your eyes, you blind old bastard, it said to itself, striding away down the ornate corridor. Filled with contempt at the thought. I’m no man. No woman. Weak, passionate, mating, animals. Moved by love and tears. Puppets on strings.

‘A moment of your time, First Minister?’ said the hospital orderly, with a slender respectful bow in the sunlit corridor. He glanced over his shoulder quickly and stepped closer; confidential. ‘It’s slow, but steady,’ he said quietly.

‘But untraceable, and irreversible?’ the winter figure whispered back. The orderly nodded. ‘Then the timescale’s secondary. Just make sure he keeps taking them.’

‘They’re his favourites,’ the orderly replied, with a cold smile. ‘It’s the only supplement he can stand the taste of. He says they’re sweet.’

‘Something poetic in that, don’t you think?’ The winter figure mused, smiling. ‘And the more he takes, the faster he goes?’

‘It has a cumulative effect,’ the orderly replied with a nod.

‘Good. If he likes them so much, double the dose. I’ll triple your pay.’

‘Of course, First Minister,’ the orderly smiled. ‘Thank you.’

‘Just get it done. Message my private contact when he’s gone.’

‘Certainly, First Minister. Death comes for us all.’

‘Quite,’ the winter figure replied, cold eyes staring. ‘For the right people it can even come on command. Make it happen.’

16

Tabitha cleared snow from her fire pit, her breath steaming in the freezing air. It’d fallen thicker this time. The lake was half frozen; sunlight glistened on the water where it lapped thinly across the ice. A dawn world of white snow on black stone, glowing gold across peaks and pines where the sunrays pierced the clouds.

Stretching stiffly by the crackling campfire, Tabitha felt a sudden jolt. She stood stock-still and looked around her.

‘What was that?’ she muttered, eyes wide and wary. It was a vibration; she hadn’t imagined it. Something fell with a quiet slap. She looked down at a pale shape on the stones at her feet. Dead skin. Squidlizard scales. And another piece, peeling from her thigh until it dropped off. It was her catsuit, pushing the foreign skin away like old plasters so it could knit together and heal. She felt the tough ribbed material shift to fit her properly, and smiled.

Tabitha huddled close to the fire and wondered if Deep Roots was alright. When her thoughts ran to Seven and Fishbowl, the guilt hit her. She should’ve found them by now. She’d climb the mountain again to search for them. If Deep Roots was alright, and if he agreed to help her, she might even make the summit in one piece.

Adjusting the knife in her belt, Tabitha found the twisted little vine tucked in there too. She gently pulled it from her belt to study it, and jumped in shock when it twitched. The twisted thing unfurled in her palm. Tiny shoots wiggling and twining round her fingers. Hungrily drinking current from her hands. With her voltage running through it, its leaves budded and swelled and opened in fast-forward, stuttering and reaching for the sunlight. The mutated stalk stretched and swayed and fleshed out stronger. A tiny flowerbud grew at the tip, with a blue-ocean glow. Tabitha stared. The bud grew rapidly to the size of her thumb; the flower burst open and writhed tiny fronds at the daylight. A luminous wonder, glowing like a ghostly blue candle in her black palms. She fed it more current and watched the flower grow taller, endlessly, in her hands. Maybe if it grew big and bright enough, Seven and Fishbowl might see it glowing. Deep Roots, or his people, might come to investigate. Maybe then she could get some help to tackle the mountain again... or at least find out if the old man was alright.

‘Let’s see what you can do,’ she told the flower brightly. Pushing more current into its twining tendrils, the plant moved and expanded. The more current she fed it the heavier it became, until she had to plant it in the dirt by the trees. Silent, staring, she put a hand on the trunk and fed its appetite. A fly landed on its electrified leaves and popped in a smelly wisp of smoke. Still the bloom twisted and grew; it was taller than her waist now. It reached as high as her chest, her head; a small tree. Creaking and rustling out new leaves and petals as it climbed. Tabitha watched its moonglow flowerhead swell from the size of a cabbage to a gigantic bloom. It cast a haunting aquacalm glow on the shore around her; its shoots shifted and reached and fattened like tree limbs. When she reached out her hand to a branch, and pulled to test its strength, she found that she could shape the wooden limb like clay as it grew. She wound another growing limb around to meet it, feeding and pulling to shape it like a living timber sculpture. A dark twining tree she could bend to her will.

‘Well, it’s... interesting,’ Tabitha muttered to herself a while later, studying the multi-limbed mess she’d made of the strange new tree. The flowerhead glowed huge and eerie among the treetops. The distant edge of the forest suddenly erupted as a pack of creatures burst from the bamboo. As they sprinted towards her, she recognised the one they were chasing. Deep Roots was frantic; running for her. The rest of his kind were on his heels, yelling and barking. Deep Roots skidded to a stop in front of her; turned his back to her and held his arms out, shielding her from the tribe. Protecting her. The group was baying for her blood, pointing knives. When a tall scarred male came forward, Deep Roots squared up to him. Furious, the big male hit him hard. The two launched into a rabid fight; a savage flurry of claws and bloodied fur. A vicious punch on the jaw staggered Deep Roots to his knees.

‘No!’ Tabitha yelled, jumping between them before the group could mob the old man. She punched the big male; he spun snarling and gripped her throat. Tabitha grabbed his thick arms and shocked him; a long sharp crackle. Paralysed, he fell back stiff as a statue and fitted on the shore. The group watched her in sudden terror, and backed away from the witch. Some were still grabbing at Deep Roots; he was fighting them off viciously.

‘Get away from him!’ she screamed at the mob wildly, running them off. Sparks hissing and crackling from her clawed hands as she shielded him. A dim wrathful light in her staring eyes. Terrified, the tribe backed away and retreated into the forest. The big scarred male was coming around; grunted and shook his head in a daze as he picked himself up. He was growling, baring his teeth. Glaring and furious. Tabitha stood up to him. Put herself between him and Deep Roots.

‘You want some more!?’ she warned the big male angrily, baring her claws. When he lunged at her she pounced. Took his fierce punch in the cheek and clutched his throat to stun him. Laid into his big scarred head as she shocked him to the ground. Shot voltage through his coarse burning fur until he juddered and collapsed. Breathing hard, Tabitha staggered up and tried to shake the fainting feeling, after draining so much energy. Palmed her cheek painfully as the skin and bone healed from his punch. Furious when he came around, the big male gave her a murderous look. Grunted curses savagely as he clutched his pounding head. He was staggering up; pulled his knife.

‘Don’t you fucking dare,’ Tabitha snarled at him, meeting his hard look. Claws out and crackling volts in warning. Watching her intensely, growling low and animal, he turned his back on them and walked off into the forest.

‘Are you ok?’ said Tabitha, wracked with worry, helping Deep Roots up where he’d collapsed. He just grunted with a sad frustration, muttering back angrily to where the pack had disappeared. ‘Come on,’ she told him, helping him limp over to the crag by the campfire. ‘You’re staying here with me.’

‘It’s good to see you again mate,’ Tabitha said gladly, as they sat down by the fire. She signed to him, fist on chest and pointing a finger, smiling. The old man smiled wearily, returning her signs. A sad look in his eyes that said he could’ve kicked that male’s arse a few years back.

‘Who was that? The big male?’ said Tabitha, pointing to the forest and signing to him. Big strong man. Fight. Scars. Deep Roots sighed through his nose at the mention of him; he pointed to the stones and then the lakeshore around them.

‘Stone Shore?’ Tabitha muttered, handing the old man a cup of tea. Taking it gladly, Deep Roots looked back at the strange giant flower in wonder. He pointed a thumb at it and looked at her with wide eyes, grunting hoarse words.

‘Yeah, that was me,’ Tabitha replied happily. It was like nothing he’d ever seen before; some new kind of bloodflower maybe. It looked a little like one, but it was the wrong colour, and way oversized. In all his years, he’d never seen a bloodflower taller than an arm’s length. But this one... this was the size of a pine. The high glowing flower was wrong too; it was white like snow and deep blue like midnight, and looked big enough to climb inside.

‘Do you like it?’ Tabitha said with a smile, walking over to it. ‘Watch this.’ Taking hold of a branch, she pushed current into it. She could feel the volts inside her, reaching into the plant; felt her mind wandering its veins and fibres and shifting them to her will. Was this some ability she’d taken from the Watchers, or one of her own? The branch was shifting and creaking; growing how she wanted it to. Deep Roots stared in shock beside her, like she was some kind of sorceress. But they weren’t alone. Over in the trees on their left, another tribal stared cautiously from the bamboo.

With a good deal of encouragement from Deep Roots, the newcomer joined them at the campfire and sat as far from Tabitha as possible, eyeing her nervously. The new arrival was more slightly built, and didn’t have Deep Roots’ gleaming blues and greens in the fur behind their head. Tabitha was sure their new guest was female; a young adult. Deep Roots grunted gruff words to reassure the woman. He pointed a finger to her and tapped his fingertips to his breastbone, then rolled his hand out in front as if some sequence was spreading away from him.

‘She’s your daughter?’ Tabitha guessed. She mimicked his hand movement of something rolling out ahead of him; like his life was passing to the next generation. Deep Roots studied Tabitha’s sign language and corrected her, adding a pointed pause and a second roll of his hand.

‘Your granddaughter?’ Tabitha replied. They mimed and signed together as he tried to explain the visitor’s name. The newcomer studied their pantomime in silent fascination, her big blue eyes darting between them as she tried to understand. The old man produced a chalk stone from his belt to scribble undulating lines on the rock wall.

‘Sea?’ said Tabitha. ‘That’s her name?’ Deep Roots grated the chalk against the rock wall to add a faint white covering. Added a blow of breath to his hand signs.

‘Not wind,’ Tabitha muttered. They already had a sign for wind; tumbling hands and palms on cheeks. She studied Deep Roots as he exhaled gently. Stared at the mist of his breath in the cold air.

‘Sea Mist?’ Tabitha realised. All the while, the young female just looked between them in silent bemusement, arms folded defensively.

‘Nice to meet you, Sea Mist,’ Tabitha said happily, reaching out to shake her visitor’s hand. The young female watched her warily with those stark blue eyes, and stepped away from the sorceress before she could cast a spell on her. Deep Roots grunted something. But Sea Mist argued, wouldn’t have it, and stepped back again to keep away. She was only here for her grandfather’s sake; she made that perfectly clear. She had no trust for the strange outsider. Deep Roots grunted words that prompted an angry reply from Sea Mist. Tabitha watched them looking at her. After a brief explosive argument about something, the old man had the final say. Sea Mist huffed and growled, and gave in. She gave Tabitha one quick distrustful glance, and led the way off into the trees.

‘Where are we going?’ Tabitha muttered cluelessly, following on behind.

Deep Roots and Sea Mist took Tabitha deeper into the forest than she’d ever been before. As the ground began to slope upwards on their trek, the thick pines and bamboo grew sparse around them and gave way to tough shrubs. Up ahead was a gigantic wall of rock; a succession of crags with no way around. Deep Roots and Sea Mist led Tabitha along the rockface, and disappeared into a narrow gap in the cliff wall.

‘Er, ok,’ Tabitha said uncertainly, hanging around outside and peering into the black passageway.

‘Kah V’ha,’ came Deep Roots’ gruff echoing voice in the dark.

‘Yeah,’ she replied, outside the cave passage. ‘I’m coming.’ God, this was weird. But she had to find out what was inside. Every thought in her head pushed her on into the dark entrance.

On the far side of a short pitch-black tunnel, where Tabitha managed to bang her head twice against the low uneven ceiling, she emerged on a scene that she’d never expected.

‘Oh my god,’ she mumbled, staring dumbfounded as Deep Roots beckoned her on down the rocky slope. Sprawling before them was a tribal village, a giant complex of caves; stacked in open tiers and terraces of bare rock. Every crevice was a home, blinking with flickering fires. Up above the cave was exposed to a giant jagged circle of open sky, casting cold bright daylight down on the terraces. At the foot of the rock walls, a blaze like a small bonfire lit the large round clearing with a warm glow. Gathered round it, a sea of staring faces. Deep Roots’ tribe. Watching her warily; the outsider. He’d brought her here to keep her safe. Jumping at a sudden bloodcurdling howl from the highest cave though, Tabitha felt anything but.

17

Aelu smiled to her date as he made his way back to their table from the men’s room. He was more rugged than handsome, she supposed; an off-world species, scarred and beige-scaled, with black shining eyes. But he had a certain confident, dangerous charisma that meant people generally just got out of his way. Aelu glanced around the restaurant and just hoped no one recognised her, or knew her husband from his Guardian days – or why she’d left him. Checking herself, she dragged her thoughts back to her date and smiled warmly to him as he sat down. She played with her necklace delicately, and smoothed her deep-blue hair down across one shoulder as she laughed at some joke he’d made. She wasn’t listening.

‘I like this place,’ her date said gruffly, sharp-teethed, sitting back in his chair to admire the high classical ceilings. ‘Maybe I’ll buy it, what do you think?’ Aelu could’ve cringed at that; instead she raised her eyebrows and tried to look equal parts impressed and aroused, and leaned in closer. Somehow he didn’t look right in a suit. He was too muscular for the tailoring, like he’d been crammed into it and was just putting up with the discomfort for her sake. He was talking again; he was always talking.

‘Hey, why don’t you finish that drink and we can talk somewhere a little more private?’ she purred to him, running her fingertip around the edge of her wine glass.

‘Yeah?’ he said with a grin, looking back to her from the waitress he’d been ogling all night. ‘Anywhere in mind?’ he asked her hungrily, as he gulped down the last of his drink.

‘How about your place?’ she said quietly, looking up from her glass to stare, smiling, into his eyes.

It took a few smacks around the head to wake him up; he was practically comatose. Maybe she shouldn’t have emptied the entire phial into his drink, she considered. When her date groaned and came around, he realised he was tied to a dining chair in his penthouse.

‘What the fuck, you psycho bitch?’ he growled groggily, trying to whip his reptile tail to catch her leg and trip her. She’d tied his tail to the chair too. When he struggled against the creaking chair Aelu pressed the pistol hard against his forehead.

‘I wouldn’t,’ she told him flatly, pushing his head back hard with the gun muzzle. ‘Tell me what you know about Ori Atur.’

‘Who?... Ohh yeah, that little shit? That’s what this is about? ...Hey, I guess you must be Mom,’ her date chuckled arrogantly. ‘Fuck, that was years ago!’

‘Tell me what happened to him,’ Aelu growled savagely, pressing the gun harder into his forehead.

‘Alright, if you want to know so bad,’ he chuckled coldly. ‘He was a rich kid looking for a reputation. But you knew that already,’ the man said with a smirk. ‘Some shithead gave him a chance. Kid thought he’d play with the real professionals, and he fucked a deal. We lost some money. We don’t like that. He shouldn’t have come anywhere near us, the limp-dick little shit. He was asking for it.’ Aelu didn’t say anything about her dead son. She just stormed over to the dining table, picked up the hammer she’d found and smashed it into his face with a dull knock. He bellowed furiously in the chair, yelling and cursing as he tried to struggle free.

‘Say that again,’ Aelu snarled, as her date spat a bloody tooth and glared at her murderously.

‘I said, he was a fucking limp-dick, mommy’s boy, useless piece of shit,’ he replied, grinning savagely. ‘I said, he was asking for it.’ Aelu swung the hammer into his face in a succession of cracks and knocks and screams, until his hard edge slowly wore off and he was begging her to stop.

‘Who killed him!?’ Aelu screamed, clutching his jaw and raising the hammer again. ‘Who killed him!?’ he said nothing. She hit him, hard. ‘Who killed him!?’ she demanded furiously. He was laughing through bloody lips. She dropped the hammer and took a pair of pliers to his mouth, clattering them in among his pointed teeth. She squeezed hard; pulled. He was screaming so loud she thought she’d go deaf as she wrenched the tooth out. ‘Who killed him!? Where are they!?’ she screamed in his bloody face. He was grunting and moaning in a pained daze; choking on blood.

‘You think you’re tough?’ he laughed at her eventually, spitting blood in her face. ‘People like you don’t last two seconds around people like me.’ Aelu dropped the pliers with a thump and took the small laser torch from her bag. It’d always been great for browning up cake toppings; it seemed to be just as good at browning up gangsters too. By the time she’d done with him he’d screamed every name he ever knew.

‘You’ve been very helpful,’ she told him approvingly, as she packed her torture tools back into her handbag on the table. He gasped and choked wet bloody words at her while her back was turned. ‘Sorry, I didn’t quite catch that,’ she said warmly, stepping closer.

‘I said, all those names I just gave you, they’re all going to take it in turns on you. And they’re all going to cut off a little piece of you when they do.’

‘That’s nice dear,’ Aelu said dismissively. ‘Thank you for dinner, by the way. This is for my son.’ She pulled the pistol from her handbag, aimed it between his manic bloodshot eyes, and blew his brains all over the giant windows and the moonlit city view.

Aelu looked around cautiously as she left the penthouse and headed for the elevator, fishing around in her handbag. The doors were opening just as she reached it; there was a man inside. A dangerous-looking man, staring right at her. He was mob; he had to be. When he saw the drops of blood on her he pulled a gun from his jacket. Panicking, Aelu snatched the gun from her handbag and shot him first before he could make up his mind. A shot in the heart that dropped him dead in the elevator. Her interrogation must’ve made too much noise; how could she be so stupid to think no one would come looking? There were footsteps up the stairs behind her; she darted into the elevator to close the doors. Tapping the button frantically for the ground floor, she breathed tensely as the elevator sank. Her hands started to shake now she realised what she’d done, drunk on wine and honour and revenge; she wasn’t thinking straight any more. She’d just killed a man. Two men. She was going to prison for a long time. This wasn’t her; she wasn’t capable of stuff like this. Panicking, heart racing, she clutched her forehead to think and raked her hair back with shaking fingers. Wide-eyed she stared around at the inside of the elevator, looking for answers. What the hell could she do now? It was just her and the man she’d killed, right there with her; caught red-handed. Hands shaking, she searched his jacket. Prised the gun from his dead fingers and shoved it in her handbag. She caught sight of herself in the full-length mirror and frantically cleaned the blood specks from her clothes with a spit-on handkerchief. She just thanked the gods that the elevator wasn’t stopping at any other floors on the way down.

The elevator glided down to the lobby; the doors pinged open. Her stomach felt in freefall. A lurching, crushing rush of fear. Heart pounding, high on adrenalin, she glanced at the security guard at his desk in the distance. She made sure the elevator doors closed on the body behind her before the guard could see, and walked quickly through the palatial lobby. Her every footstep was an echoing knock on the polished stone floor. Nothing but still silence all around her, heavy as lead in the air. She was almost past the security desk. She just had to get out to the street, then she was gone. Just had to get through that–

‘Evening miss,’ the guard said pleasantly, making her jump. He had a kind smile. He wouldn’t be smiling when he found the bodies. He might even try to kill her himself; maybe he was mob too. She didn’t know.

‘Good evening,’ Aelu replied stiffly, trying a smile. Heading for the doors. She just had to get out. Had to get away from here before anyone realised.

‘Let me get that for you,’ he said warmly, opening the front doors with the control panel on his desk. Here and now, as jumpy as she was, it was the most terrifying thing anyone had ever said to her. Any attention was bad attention. She just had to get away before he found out. With one last quick smile to him for the sake of normality, Aelu headed out into the fresh night air. She glanced around for any sign of anyone, and walked off down the empty street. Was this it then? Had she gotten away with it? She’d need to head for another planet, obviously. Get a new passport once she got there, a new identity, and disappear. Or would the Guardians know by then? Would she need a fake passport now? Like right now? From who, the mob? She’d just killed a mob boss. As in, actually killed a mob boss.

‘I’m fucked,’ she mumbled in quiet shock, turning the street corner for the colossal city strip. The city looked beautiful tonight; all soaring statued skyscrapers lit up in the starry black. A glowing nocturnal heaven all around her.

Probably the last time I’ll ever see this sight, she told herself, as she hurried on. She tried in vain to enjoy it, one last time.

‘Spare some change?’ said a croaky voice. Aelu jumped and looked in the doorway she was passing by. ‘Sorry, didn’t mean to frighten you,’ the old man said pleasantly.

‘Yes of course, here,’ she said, numb with dread that he might see the bloodstains her coat was mostly hiding. She snatched the coins from her purse with shaking hands and pushed them into his wrinkled old paws. No one used physical currency any more, since the upgrade to Ministry credits. She only kept a few coins on her in case of charity collectors. Or homeless people, of course.

‘You’re very kind, thank you,’ he croaked gratefully, grinning a gap-toothed smile.

‘That’s ok,’ she replied nervously, glancing over her shoulder as she walked off.

‘I’m a war veteran, you know,’ he told her, striking up a conversation. Or trying to. Against every scrap of decency she’d been raised with, she ignored him and carried on walking.

‘Well, have a nice night lady. Bye,’ he called after her. Aelu felt her heart ache when she heard that, and couldn’t look back at him. She just hurried on into the night. Damn it, why couldn’t he have been a bastard about it? Yelled at her to go to hell or something? Anything to make it easier to walk away? She had to get out of here though. Had to get away.

Oh Gods. Someone was walking towards her, on the far pavement. She tried to walk past as quickly as she could.

‘Aelu? Aelu Atur?’ the woman called to her, crossing the street.

‘Yes?’ she replied, terrified. Shit. She was a Guardian officer.

‘Mrs Atur, I’m arresting you on suspicion of manslaughter.’ Aelu felt her stomach turn. The officer was rattling off her rights; reaching for cuffs on her belt.

‘What are you talking about?’ Aelu blurted out, feigning indignation. Voice shaking. ‘Whose manslaughter?’

‘Your husband’s, Mrs Atur,’ the officer replied coldly, staring into her eyes. Taking her wrist to put the cuffs on her.

I can’t go to prison. Not until I’ve gotten revenge for my son. Then they can do whatever they want. But only then. Gripped by a sudden panic, Aelu shoved her away and hoped to the Gods she could make a run for it. But the officer pulled her gun; yelled at her to get on the ground. Panicking with the pistol aimed at her, Aelu pulled her own gun and shot her dead, high on adrenalin, with reactions she never knew she had. She looked around frantically as the gunshot echoed down the empty late-night street. The homeless man stared in horror and held up his paws. Shaking his head for mercy; terrified. He must’ve thought she was going to kill him too. Stomach turning, horrified at herself, Aelu stuffed the pistol back in her bag and ran for a side street before anyone turned up. So she’d killed Raia, then. A mob boss too, and his goon. And now a Guardian officer. The world’s most law-abiding citizen had lost her mind and killed a Guardian officer in the street. She was sweating; heart pounding and sickness churning in her stomach. She had to get away. That was all that mattered now. Had to get off this world and disappear. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she ran breathlessly for the distant glow of the spaceport. Had to get away. It wasn’t like she could leave her old life behind now; she didn’t have an old life any more. She’d killed it. Killed her husband after that fight; it had to be that blow to the head. The Guardians wanted her, and the mob wanted her worse. They’d find her first, for sure. If she didn’t get off this world tonight, she was dead.

18

The big scarred alpha and his gang of retainers had Tabitha and Deep Roots surrounded. Tall fierce silhouettes in the hearthfire’s glow. The gang’s whoops and growls echoed off the craggy rock walls in the cavern clearing, as the rest of the tribe watched in tense silence. Woodsmoke and dog-smell filled the cold air. All Tabitha heard was an endless stream of guttural growls and barked words, deep and harsh in alien throats. A nervous knot twisted in her stomach.

‘I named you outcast,’ Stone Shore snarled menacingly, stalking around Deep Roots in the silent clearing. ‘I told you I would take your life if you returned here.’ Barks and calls from the mob.

‘Then take it,’ Deep Roots sighed wearily, in a voice older than time, addressing the rest of the tribe as much as the gang surrounding him. ‘I am only a messenger. This woman is a lost spirit. It is my sacred duty to bring her to home-cave.’

‘She is a witch! A demon!’ Stone Shore bellowed furiously. Angry yells from the tribe around him. ‘She would come into our home like a serpent, and you would lead her here!?’ he spat. An angry growl crept through the crowd all around them, trembling Deep Roots’ old chest with a rolling hum. Tabitha could only watch and wonder at what the hell was going on; claws inching out and heartcore pounding.

‘She is no demon!’ Deep Roots replied, with total conviction. ‘She came to us on a great bird spirit. She is spirit-born. Like us.’

‘Enough!’ Stone Shore snapped viciously, sharp teeth bared. He stormed out from the mob and grabbed Tabitha by the throat. Instantly she lashed out in panic and scrambled away; crouched to pounce, ready for a fight. Stone Shore barked at her savagely, pacing in the clearing, and studied his claw cuts as the mob snarled all around them.

‘Touch me again and I’ll kill you,’ Tabitha growled at him, meeting his stare. They were muttering gruff unknown words all around her.

‘Listen to me! She knows the painted words!’ Deep Roots yelled to the tribe, putting himself between Tabitha and Stone Shore to stop the brewing fight. ‘She is one of us!’

‘She is nothing like us!’ Stone Shore bellowed, shoving Deep Roots down in the dirt.

‘Hey!’ Tabitha yelled, as the old man dropped.

‘We do not choose our skins!’ Deep Roots appealed desperately, as Stone Shore and the mob moved in to surround Tabitha. Circled in to kill the demon. Deep Roots dragged himself to his feet and barged in hard among the mob to stand beside her. He took a hard punch from Stone Shore in return. Lip bleeding, he stood defiant.

‘Move,’ Stone Shore growled fiercely, towering over him. ‘Move!’ Glancing at the murderous mob all around them, Deep Roots turned and grabbed Tabitha’s hand. He ushered her to crouch down with him, and moved her claw to scratch vague panicked shapes in the packed dirt. He stared into Tabitha’s eyes, terrified. Pointed at her. Begged her to follow his lead before the gang killed her.

Tabitha didn’t understand what’d been said, but Deep Roots stared at her as if their lives depended on what she did next. Taking his cue, she quickly scratched shapes into the dirt. Drew the only image from Deep Roots’ cave paintings that she remembered stroke for stroke. The one that looked like Seven.

‘See! She came to us on a great bird spirit, from Sacred Mountain!’ Deep Roots yelled to the crowd all around him. ‘This spirit!’ Some were craning their necks to see her picture as Tabitha stood up and backed away, like she was on trial.

‘She knows the painted words? Truly?’ a mother called out from the crowd.

‘She does,’ Deep Roots replied. ‘The Spirits are with her, as they’re with all of us. She speaks their painted words. She is spirit-born, just as we are.’

‘Any child can scrawl in the dirt!’ Stone Shore barked angrily, gripping Deep Roots by the throat. The crowd were muttering uncertainly; gasping that old Deep Roots may soon be gone.

‘Then teach her like a child!’ Deep Roots croaked as loudly as he could, pleading for the stranger’s life. ‘Teach her the ways!’ he called out passionately, struggling from Stone Shore’s grip. There were murmurs in the crowd; a change of heart. Stone Shore was furious; he pulled the glass knife from his belt and pressed it against Deep Roots’ throat. When Tabitha came forward to help him though, Deep Roots pushed her back.

‘Enough!’ Stone Shore bellowed. ‘Kill her!’

‘The First Ancestor walked in endless winter!’ Deep Roots told the crowd desperately, as if he was summoning life itself.

‘He found Lost Spirits weeping on every hill and shore,’ his granddaughter Sea Mist called out, reciting the ancient prayer.

‘With holy hands he struck the first flame in the darkness!’ more voices joined in around the clearing.

‘He taught Fierce-Hope, the Ancient Way, as they gathered round!’ the crowd replied. Stone Shore stared furiously into Deep Roots’ eyes as he thought on the holy words. It was not his place to question the Ancient Way. The people would not follow him if he did.

‘Look at her,’ Deep Roots told the crowd, motioning to Tabitha. ‘Is this not a Lost Spirit before you? She comes to us from the Spirit Land, she has no fur against the winter! Without our help she will die here! If she is not a Lost Spirit, then what is she? If this is not the will of First Ancestor, then what is?’ The villagers were murmuring among themselves. Stone Shore looked around at them furiously.

‘Let her live,’ said a woman in the crowd, her young cub watching where she held him to her shoulder.

‘The witch dies! I am king, I command it!’ Stone Shore shot back angrily, his thick voice echoing in the caves.

‘You are not king over the First Ancestor,’ said a frail old man in the crowd. ‘You do not make commands over his will.’ More of the tribe joined their voices to the fray.

‘She is a demon! You will see it before the end!’ Stone Shore bellowed against their voices, watching Tabitha’s eyes shine cat-like where they reflected the fire.

‘Fierce-Hope!’ a man called out in the crowd. ‘Fierce-Hope for the lost spirit!’

‘Fierce-Hope!’ an old woman joined in. ‘You will not take her life!’

‘Fierce-Hope!’ a little cub shouted angrily, running out into the circle as if he was ready to fight Stone Shore himself. ‘It’s the Ancient Way! You can’t hurt her!’

More of the crowd joined their voices to the call. Tabitha just wished she could understand what they were chanting so passionately. Why more and more of them looked ready to tear Stone Shore to shreds all of a sudden. Snarling, cheated, Stone Shore shoved Deep Roots away.

‘Silence!’ he roared at the villagers, baring his fangs. ‘So be it! She lives! By First Ancestor, it is done!’ he said bitterly.

‘It is the right decision, my king,’ Deep Roots said humbly. ‘It is the will of First Ancestor.’ Stone Shore took it as an insult. He turned and shoved the old man to the ground, ready to hit him. Tabitha ran in to shield him; sprang her claws out. Staring Stone Shore in those big cold eyes. Ready to fight for her friend.

‘I know you won’t understand this, but go fuck yourself,’ Tabitha told Stone Shore. Holding his stare. She watched him hesitate from the fight, and helped Deep Roots to his feet.

‘I will be watching you, Old Roots,’ Stone Shore snarled in contempt. ‘I will be watching your child.’ With that, he walked off back to the hearthfire as his gang of retainers followed behind. ‘She is a witch! Your softness curses us!’ he bellowed to the crowd. ‘First Ancestor alone stays my hand. For now,’ he snarled. ‘But watch closely as Deep Roots teaches this child,’ he called out, pointing a clawed finger at Tabitha. ‘Watch closely while her magic weaves and the tribe unravels! You’ll be begging me to kill her once she brings her demons down on our heads!’

The tribe muttered uncertainly as they dispersed, going back to their lives on the rocky terraces. Some were busy; others were sneaking glances down at Tabitha and Deep Roots in the clearing.

‘Well that all seemed... intense,’ Tabitha told Deep Roots, as he led her away with a gentle smile. He sighed and turned his back on Stone Shore in his rock throne, as if to put the whole thing behind them. ‘Look, I’ve got no idea what just happened, but I get the feeling you just saved my life,’ she told him, stopping in the clearing to take hold of his hands. ‘Thank you.’ She looked deep into his weary old eyes, and watched his craggy face lift with the warmest smile she’d ever seen in her life. He spoke to her quietly then, gentle and gruff. She wished to god she could understand whatever he’d said to the crowd.

‘Come on, red-mane,’ Deep Roots told her warmly, glancing at her bright tangled hair. He wondered when she’d begin to understand his words. ‘Let’s earn you a name.’

Deep Roots acted as her guide around the village, and happily hugged the tribe’s young cubs as they greeted him like a long-lost grandfather. Hoisting up a grabby little cub to carry her against his shoulder, Deep Roots walked Tabitha around the caves. The little girl he carried gnawed on her tiny claws and stared at Tabitha intently, and whispered things into Deep Roots’ old ear about how strange she looked. He grunted hoarse soothing words, and reassured her. Tabitha watched them and smiled, and looked around at this alien people. Well... she was the alien here. In many ways they were so much like humanity; but so unlike them too. Or, maybe, they just had something humanity had lost. They sat together on the dirt, talking about hunts and thoughts; they were part of this world. Unremoved from it. Likewise, she couldn’t remember seeing anyone on Earth spend so much time with their kids. Watching the tribe get along fine without schools, or salaries... giving their families the best hours of their day... she couldn’t help but wonder if there could’ve been another way for Earth. At least a compromise, a fairer balance, for a bit less work and a bit more life; for people to enjoy each other, like these people did.

Too late now, she thought, heartbroken. All those people. All those families and friends. Was she the last one left? The last remnant of humanity? She could’ve broken down at the thought then, the grief was so all-consuming. Tabitha jumped suddenly, distracted from her sadness; the little girl in Deep Roots’ arms was playing with her hair.

‘Why’s it red?’ the cub giggled in her high clear voice, scrunching the matted curls in her little fingers. Tabitha could only stand there, stock-still and smiling.

‘Because the Spirit Land made her that way,’ Deep Roots explained.

‘Why can’t she understand us?’ a little boy asked him, coming closer to lift Tabitha’s heavy black hands and inspect the hard skin. The first of his kind to see metal.

‘Well, there could be lots of different tongues in the Spirit Land,’ Deep Roots told the boy, leading Tabitha on around the village. ‘It’ll take her time to learn our ways, and our speech. We need to help her.’

‘I’ll help her,’ the little boy replied dutifully. ‘We have to help Lost Spirits find their way.’

‘What’s he saying?’ Tabitha asked Deep Roots happily, as the little boy chattered away to her and carried on inspecting her hand. She pointed to the cub and mimicked a talking mouth with her hand. Deep Roots grinned and thought how best to explain. Tried to sign to her. He. Helps. You.

‘He wants to help me?’ Tabitha smiled. ‘What’s his name?’ she tapped her heart and pointed to the cub. Deep Roots smiled back and put the little girl down. He produced a chalky stone and scrawled pictures on the rock wall beside them.

‘His name’s Sun And Rain?’ Tabitha said quizzically, puzzling over the sunshine and raincloud Deep Roots was scribbling. He drew trees beneath them, heavy with summer leaves. Crude flowers in bloom.

‘Summer Rain?’ Tabitha wondered. She looked down at the boy as he moved her heavy fingers about, studying the angular grain of her alien fingerprints. ‘Nice to meet you,’ she said warmly, taking the cub’s hand in hers to shake it. Summer Rain laughed, trying to pull his hand out of hers like she was playing a game. Grinning at her, with those icy feline eyes of his tribe.

Continuing their tour, Deep Roots introduced Tabitha to each member of the tribe in turn. Without exception, every one of them offered her food to welcome her. She had to decline, and tried to explain that she fed from the sun. They didn’t seem to understand, but accepted her polite refusal with a mixture of good grace and confusion.

‘So, what are your names?’ she asked them, trying to change the subject so no one got offended. She tapped her fingers to her breastbone. Deep Roots translated for her, and the tribe obliged around her. He patiently doodled and signed each name in turn as they told her, and there were lots of names. Dusk Sky and his mate Birdsong, and their daughter Bright Petal. White Cloud, kind and motherly. Raging Flame, brash and passionate. Warm Breeze, Clear Water, and old Rising Shoots and Solid Ground, still hugging like teenagers. The names went on as more joined the crowd. Autumn Moon, Winter Frost, Spring Vine; and little Summer Rain she recognised with his loud boisterous voice. More names; more than she had any hope of remembering right now, but Deep Roots continued anyway. One of the more aggressive little boys playing around the fire was Rising Thunder; another, Lasting Frost. Stone Shore, she already knew. He was staring from his seat by the hearthfire, watching intently. She didn’t need to guess why he was called Stone Shore.

Hard and cold, she told herself. Looking around, Tabitha noticed a little girl watching them where she sat. Nervous and silent as everyone followed Tabitha’s gaze and stared at her.

‘What about her?’ said Tabitha, waving to the little girl. The young cub smiled and waved back. Tabitha felt like her heart would pop right then, she was so cute. She tapped her breastbone to sign the question. Deep Roots shook his head and smiled, and more in the gathering grunted the same sounds.

‘She doesn’t have a name?’ Tabitha replied, understanding Deep Roots’ signs. ‘Why not?’

She’s not grown, Deep Roots signed. She hasn’t, been given, her name.

‘So people need to earn them?’ said Tabitha, signing as best she could. ‘How?’ Smiling, Deep Roots’ reply was a simple sign.

In time.

Later Tabitha sat quietly for a while on her own, at Deep Roots’ request, to watch how life went about in the tribe. To understand its spirit, as he’d put it. Even just sitting around at rest – and there was lots of that – Tabitha could see people taking a great deal of time just to care for one another. Much more than she was used to seeing in her old life. The whole village talked like family, sitting in groups to tell stories and chew roots. She watched a young female outside a cave nearby, feeding roasted meat to her mate by their fire. He was lying back with his head on her lap, resting. Both laughing; mumbling pillow talk. Eyes only for one another; drunk on love. Across the way, beyond the central Hearthfire, an old male groomed his mate and massaged her shoulders, while she sat quietly and breathed deep in her dotage. Watching the cubs playing roughly on the terraces, Tabitha’s eyes were drawn to the rustling sway of the trees that grew near the high cave ceiling, and the open sky above. There, just beneath them, she saw rising steam. Rocky hotpools. Stone Shore sat in the largest steaming pool, dozing and dominant, as the cold wind blew snow down from the giant natural skylight above.

Wrapped cosily in a warm fur that night, Tabitha lay nodding off in a cave she shared with Deep Roots’ granddaughter, Sea Mist, and an older woman called Winter Blossom. They were still kind of stand-offish with her though, like they weren’t supposed to engage with her. She wondered if, in time, she’d be treated less like a burden and more like a friend.

Oh my god, she said to herself, sitting bolt upright. I’ve forgotten Seven and Fishbowl.

Tabitha rushed across the clearing and woke Deep Roots quietly in a panic, trying to explain. But with only the pale moonlight to see by, she couldn’t make her hurried signs and hushed questions understood.

My friends, my family, she tried to sign. They’ve disappeared. Have you seen them? Can you help me climb the mountain again? Deep Roots took her hands in his, and whispered deep soothing words.

Calm down, he assured her. Go back to sleep. We’ll talk tomorrow.

‘You don’t understand, I need to get to my friends,’ Tabitha whispered desperately. Trying to think how best to put it into signs. But Deep Roots was adamant, no matter how many times she tried to explain. He just kept telling her not to worry, about whatever it was; that it could wait until tomorrow. In the end Tabitha had to give up, sighing as she walked back to her cave. She could head out tonight, to search for her monsters again... but would she make it up the freezing summit in the dark? Would it be just like her last attempt? Deep Roots had helped her down easily from the slopes, on what they called Sacred Mountain; surely these people could help her climb back up. They knew this place.

I need their help, she told herself, watching the sleeping tribe. I need to get on their side.

19

Sea Mist woke Tabitha with a shake and pushed a hunting bow into her hands.

‘Hmm?’ Tabitha mumbled drowsily. Sea Mist whispered some stern command, and led her out of the caves while everyone slept. Tabitha followed her into the pitch-black passageway; banged her head and cursed.

‘I need to talk to Deep Roots first,’ said Tabitha, rubbing her smarting head. ‘I need to ask him about–

‘Sss!’ Sea Mist hissed, shushing her. As they emerged into the freezing forest, Tabitha realised it wasn’t even dawn. The stars were out; a faint hint of light glowed in one side of the sky. That must be East.

‘Any reason why we’re up so early?’ Tabitha yawned quietly. Not quietly enough. Sea Mist hissed and smacked her in the head, glaring angrily; the unspoken equivalent of shut the fuck up. Tabitha stared, gritted her teeth, and stayed quiet. Something rustled in the bushes; Sea Mist froze and drew her bow with a quiet creak. Staring into the gloom, she turned to follow the sound... then it was gone. Sighing, she signalled to Tabitha and led her on into the snow-pale forest.

They trekked to a wide pool fed by a stream, far to the east. The dawn light grew as they hid away in the trees, opposite a flat bank beside the water. The silty mud was smooth cracked chocolate, glowing dim glossy orange in the rising sun. The sky beyond the pines, pink dust on powder blue. As the light grew, Sea Mist nudged Tabitha and nodded to the ground. Hoofprints crowded the flat muddy bank.

Hunt where the animals drink, Tabitha noted. Let them come to you.

Hiding in the tall bushes, settling down to wait, Sea Mist nudged Tabitha to try her own bow. Shoved her into the right stance. Tabitha gripped the bow awkwardly, and slowly notched an arrow to the sinewy string. The arrow was rough, thick and glass-headed; fletched with two greasy mothbird feathers. Pulling back on it against the string, it didn’t feel right. Sighing impatiently, Sea Mist grabbed Tabitha’s left wrist and showed her how to grip the bow properly. How to rest the arrow tip on her left hand, where she held the bow. She signed that her right hand needed to draw the bowstring right back to her jaw. To aim with the arrowhead, and loose it. Glancing at Sea Mist, trying again, Tabitha got a stern nod of approval. Practised the movements over and over, while they waited for something to show up.

A while later, Tabitha’s huntress enthusiasm had lost its shine. Later still, she sat banging the back of her head softly against a tree.

God, this is boring. But she couldn’t argue with Sea Mist’s teaching style. As in, she literally couldn’t argue with her. She’d get smacked again. Craving sleep, Tabitha wrestled against her drooping eyelids. Pinched her wrist. Dammit woman, stay awake.

She woke abruptly to a hard poke in the head. She’d dropped off completely; Sea Mist couldn’t have looked more pissed off. There were strange bronze deer-things across the pool. Hidden, Tabitha watched Sea Mist and slowly raised her bow. Sea Mist held her arm to stop her. She nodded to the deer, telling her to watch them. The animals were so cautious, it was frustrating. Every change in the breeze made them look around, noses twitching in the cold air; ears pivoting at the slightest noise in the forest.

One deer finally stooped to drink. When Sea Mist let go of Tabitha’s arm, she felt a lurch in her stomach. The pressure was on. Slowly, silently, Tabitha knocked the arrow and raised her bow. Breathing in, she pulled the bowstring back with a quiet creak in the birdsong silence. Sea Mist studied the deer intensely and drew her own bow. Tabitha’s arms shook to hold the string back, taking aim. When the deer raised its head and turned aside Tabitha loosed the arrow with a twang, straight through the trees, missing the scattering herd by a mile. Sea Mist shot; a thump and a yelp as the deer staggered and the herd disappeared. Suddenly Sea Mist was up and running. Tabitha struggled to keep up. She watched her circle the pool, tug a knife from her belt and kneel to stab the deer in the heart. Quick and clean. Muttering to it; some kind of chant as she pulled the knife. Sea Mist grunted to Tabitha; motioning to help lift the kill.

Carrying the deer back to home-cave between them, Tabitha’s back and shoulders were killing her. They dropped it down by the hearthfire, and it looked like Sea Mist’s work was done. She sat to warm herself by the crackling flames, as the tribe called and gathered to process the deer. Hanging and bleeding it; collecting the blood. Setting it down to skin and gut and butcher it. One man carried the bloody hide away; another the intestines. A woman cut the heart and lungs out and slapped them down in the dirt. Tabitha felt sick at the sight and the smell, and edged off to sit with Sea Mist.

‘Ah, ah,’ Sea Mist told her, motioning to go and help. You haven’t done anything yet, was the gist of it. Get to work.

A while later, with the deer freshly butchered, the tribe ate and rested contentedly around the hearthfire. Stone Shore had smacked a juvenile down fiercely for daring to take the first cuts of meat; no one objected. An old woman Tabitha couldn’t name was showing her how to cut the remaining venison thinly and smoke it for the winter, when Deep Roots came over and led her away.

‘What’s up?’ said Tabitha, as he led her out into the forest. The old man was anxious to talk; maybe now she could ask him to help find her friends.

Secret, Deep Roots told her, patting his closed mouth. Talk, no one.

‘I won’t,’ Tabitha assured him, growing concerned. ‘What’s wrong?’

Deep Roots led her to a rocky dell beneath a dark crag, far from the caves. He walked to a large flat boulder of slate, and pulled a chalk from his furs. Watching him scribble nervously in the biting wind, Tabitha noticed that the sheer flat rock had been drawn on previously and scrubbed clean. Whatever Deep Roots was scrawling, he’d done it before and hadn’t wanted people to see. Who’d he shown this to? His granddaughter Sea Mist? Or someone else?

‘What’s that?’ said Tabitha, studying his first scrawled image on the slate. It was crude and cave-style, but there was no mistaking the shape. It was a man with devil horns. A man with a gun. Deep Roots pointed two fingers to his eyes, and pointed back at the image.

‘Where did you see them?’ Tabitha replied, in sudden concern. ‘Are they close?’ Deep Roots held his hand up flat, moving it like something flying in the air. He tapped the slate with the chalk and drew what he meant. A boomerang shape, with a long rectangle through the middle. Fire coming from the boomerang wings.

‘A ship,’ Tabitha mumbled, aghast. ‘Where?’ Deep Roots hushed her, and looked around to make sure no one was watching. As if even talking about this was sacrilege. He drew more ships, more demons. All with shining dot-eyes and sticks like guns.

‘This is crazy,’ Tabitha muttered. No way Deep Roots was making this up; he’d seen it. Or someone else had been here and told him about it, and they’d tried to hide the evidence of their secret meeting. ‘Does Stone Shore know about this?’ she asked him quietly, taking a clump of wet moss to help him wipe the slate. She made herself look bigger to sign Stone Shore, and tapped her head for knowing. Deep Roots nodded, then sighed, and looked particularly stressed about the subject.

‘But he won’t let anyone talk about it?’ Tabitha asked him. She signed Stone Shore and silence. Deep Roots sighed and mirrored her, shrugging hopelessly. It made sense that someone as proud as Stone Shore wouldn’t talk about this stuff. These strange demons, with their weapons and dark magic... they could threaten their entire way of life. Unless Stone Shore had dismissed it all angrily as the ravings of a madman; a devil-worshipper or something. Whatever his reasons, and whatever the people felt about it, the threat was very real. These might be demons to the tribe; to her they looked like soldiers and dropships. The people had to know the truth.

‘There could be a fight coming,’ Tabitha told him solemnly, as they scrubbed every last trace from the rock. She signed war. Deep Roots looked at her in total defeat, and nodded.

‘I can help you,’ she said, taking his old hand. Pointing between him and herself. ‘I could help you fight them, if it comes to that.’ He seemed to understand. ‘And there’s no way we could talk to Stone Shore about this?’ she said, signing. ‘No way we could change his mind, to do something about it?’

No. He would cast you out, Deep Roots explained. Like him.

‘Who?’ Tabitha replied, tapping her heart and shrugging. The old man walked to a tree nearby and picked away the bark. Tapped the bare wood underneath.

‘Bare Tree?’ Tabitha tried. ‘Barkless Tree?’

He was cast out, Deep Roots signed to her. He warned, about the demons. Stone Shore, accused him. Of being a demon. He cast, Barkless Tree, out.

‘This is insane,’ Tabitha mumbled, pacing around in the dell. ‘Where’s Barkless Tree now?’ Deep Roots shrugged and shook his head. ‘There’s invaders out there, whether Stone Shore wants it or not,’ Tabitha said to herself, searching the leaf-littered ground for ideas. That’s it.

‘Can you help me climb the mountain?’ she said, taking the chalk to scrawl Seven on the slate. Tapping it with a metal finger. ‘I can help you, and protect you. Can you help me find my bird-spirit? Up the mountain?’

I’m too old to climb it, to the top, Deep Roots signed wearily. It’s too high. The tribe, won’t help you, without a name. Barkless Tree, will help you. I’ll ask him. Be patient. Help the tribe.

‘Ok,’ Tabitha said with a smile, desperate to see Seven and Fishbowl again. ‘Thank you.’

Tabitha returned to the caves with fresh purpose, to help out as much as she could. To earn her place. In return the tribe might give her a name sooner; maybe even help her climb the mountain to search for Seven and Fishbowl.

The bones and sinew from this morning’s deer were already axe shafts, knife hilts and thread; the hide was being stretched and scraped for clothing. Helping the tribe to broom and smoke their caves for pests, and shape glass arrowheads by the hearthfire, Tabitha watched people come and go all afternoon; grazing constantly on roots, insects and whatever nuts or berries they could find.

The more she helped, the more people taught her – like how to start fires with damp wood, by feathering a stick with a knife; or how to stitch a fur-and-bone belt for herself, even with her clumsy fingers. She learned not to take a piss anywhere near home-cave, and that alien tribespeople did indeed shit in the woods. She also learned, painfully, that a lot of people had a lot of priority before her. Good drinking water; good tools; a warmer place by the hearthfire. Tabitha was right on the bottom rung. The fact that she wouldn’t even shove the cubs around to get her way was a source of endless laughter for the tribe. She was soft.

Others came back with fish that evening, as the sky darkened above the caves. Tabitha watched as they processed their meagre catch, and got involved. The fish weren’t carefully processed like the deer; just quickly cut and gutted and ready to cook. The stinking guts thrown in the fire. Wrapping the fish in thick clumps of wet moss, the tribe set them down to steam in red-hot rocks near the flames. Unwrapping them as the moss dried, to share increasingly meagre mouthfuls down the hierarchy.

Sea Mist had avoided her for the rest of the day, maybe because of her failure on the hunt. Tabitha watched Deep Roots take her to one side. They glanced across the clearing to the hearthfire where she sat. They were talking about her.

‘She’s useless,’ Sea Mist told her grandfather. ‘I could have killed two deer this morning in the time it took her to miss one. Why did you get me stuck with this child?’

‘Imagine you were her,’ Deep Roots replied gently. ‘Imagine you woke up in a strange world, where nothing was as you knew it. You didn’t know how to do anything to live. Would you need help?’ Sea Mist sighed impatiently.

‘Would you need help?’ Deep Roots repeated, looking her in the eyes.

‘Yes,’ Sea Mist conceded, arms crossed moodily. ‘She doesn’t know anything though.’

‘Then teach her,’ Deep Roots insisted, smiling.

‘But why does it have to be me?’ said Sea Mist. ‘Do you think so little of me, that you put this burden on me?’

‘No child, not at all,’ Deep Roots replied gently. ‘It’s because I think so highly of you, that I put this burden on you. This duty. You have strength, skill, and wisdom. I want her to learn from our best.’ Sea Mist glanced at him; her hard look softened.

‘Yes? And I hope there’s some reward for this great duty?’ she said.

‘She’ll at least teach you patience, you grumpy brat,’ Deep Roots replied, grinning. ‘Now leave me be. Go and teach her.’

‘Teach her what?’ Sea Mist sighed impatiently. ‘How to wipe her arse?’ Deep Roots chuckled.

‘You know what,’ he said.

Studying them secretively by the fire, Tabitha watched them go their separate ways across the clearing. What’d they been saying about her? Sea Mist was walking over now; grunted a moody hello.

‘Hi,’ Tabitha replied uncertainly, as Sea Mist took a short length of bamboo from a stack and sat down beside her.

‘We’re making fire?’ said Tabitha. She watched Sea Mist split the bamboo lengthways with a glass axe, and shave its powdery bark into a bundle of curly tinder. She drilled a hole inside one hollowed half-tube, sawed a slit on the outside to meet it, and sat it over the tinder on the ground like a long little roof. Handing Tabitha the other half-pipe, Sea Mist made her saw its long edge back and forth against the slit in the first piece. Holding it down tight on the ground over the tinder beneath, sawing harder and faster, Tabitha studied her work intently. Determined not to let Sea Mist down. Harder and faster still, and suddenly the slitted tube was smoking. Tabitha’s heart soared. Sea Mist stopped her, and knocked on the half-tube on the ground. Lifting it away, a small black coal was smoking in the nest of shavings.

‘It worked!’ Tabitha said delightedly, ruining whatever scrap of cool she’d just earned. Stony-faced, Sea Mist told her to pick up the tinder and push it together, and blow into the smoking bundle. Tabitha watched in wonder as the flame sprang to life between her fingers.

‘What now?’ she said, the fire blazing in her hands, feeling nothing. Sea Mist looked more and more impressed that Tabitha could just hold on to it. It occurred to Tabitha then, being a stone-age kind of tribe, that they might never have seen metal before. Certainly not metal hands. Enjoying the look on Sea Mist’s face, Tabitha tossed the kindling into the hearthfire and dusted the soot from her hands.

‘Watch this,’ she said, taking a bamboo half-pipe and dousing it with water. When the wood buzzed with current in Tabitha’s hands, Sea Mist backed away. Black charred veins and sparks appeared in the bamboo; Sea Mist muttered in shock at the witch’s strange power.

‘Admit it, you’re impressed,’ said Tabitha, grinning as she fed tinder to the smoking wood, and watched it burst into flames.

20

‘You’re like the personal trainer from hell,’ Tabitha muttered grumpily, as Sea Mist marched her up distant foothills the next morning. ‘How can anyone hunt in this?’ she grumbled, breath steaming and wrapped in furs, as the snow tumbled down thickly around them. Every footstep was a soft muffled crunch; they stood out like sore thumbs in the white world. Eventually Sea Mist stopped among the rocks by a dark pool, and strung the bow. She signalled Tabitha to sit down with her and hide.

They sat in silence for ages. Tabitha couldn’t feel her face any more, it was so cold. Sea Mist told her to pull her fur vest up to cover her mouth, like she did. It’ll keep your face warm, she signed. And stop the animals seeing your breath.

Sea Mist wasn’t interested in the mothbirds that landed to drink. Apparently they tasted bad or they were poisonous; something like that. When a stork-looking thing landed down though, she was straight in with a killing shot. Tabitha watched sadly as the graceful bird flapped and fell. Sea Mist passed her the bow and smiled her challenge, walking off to bring back her kill. It was Tabitha’s turn now.

They sat and waited for a while; two silent heaps of snow-covered furs among the rocks. Tabitha shivered as she gripped the bow, and hunched down tighter in her clothes. For the longest time, nothing happened but the falling snow. When a reptilian hare-thing crept closer, Tabitha aimed slowly, took her shot... and missed. She stared dead ahead, sighed, and took her obligatory smack to the head without complaint.

This is ridiculous, Tabitha told herself, as they waited forever. Freezing her arse off, both cheeks, then the rest of her. I’m not going to become Robin Hood in a couple of days. I’d need an entire movie montage for that. Studying the pool, Tabitha saw a fish down there in the murk. Looked to Sea Mist. Sea Mist signed and shook her head; apparently they were too hard to catch without a net.

‘I don’t need a net,’ Tabitha replied, dipping her hand in the dark freezing water. She sent a shock down her arm with a faint crackle, and watched stunned primeval fish float to the surface. Lifted one dripping with a victorious smile. Sea Mist was speechless; signless. When the hefty fish came around in her hand and wrestled for freedom, Tabitha realised she didn’t know how to kill it. She didn’t want to fry the poor bugger alive with her current; reluctantly, she swung it head-first against a rock. Its armoured scales were too thick. The thing was still struggling.

‘Oh god,’ she mumbled, panicking, gingerly hitting it again. Sea Mist was laughing as she passed her a knife. She showed her how to hold it down, part its thick armour at the gills and quickly take its head off. Grimacing at the task, Tabitha did as she was told and put it out of its misery. It was still rough to end an animal’s life like that; they weren’t silver spiders out to kill her. But this was where food came from, after all. It was getting easier.

‘So... more fish?’ she said, putting the dead one in Sea Mist’s open hand.

Go ahead, Sea Mist signed back, with a rare smile.

Trekking back down the foothills, tired and aching, Tabitha trailed behind Sea Mist as they headed into the forest towards home-cave. She’d caught a lot of fish, and Sea Mist had gladly helped her bundle them up with furs and cordage. Except now, she had to carry them back. And Sea Mist took particular delight in letting her. She walked on ahead with the stork slung over her shoulder, looking back every so often with a mocking smile.

‘Cheers mate. Really appreciate it,’ Tabitha said bitterly, hoisting the stinking bundle of fish back up on her aching shoulders. ‘Oh good, it’s raining,’ she added flatly, looking up at the darkening clouds.

Thunder rumbled overhead. Distant lightning scarred the murky sky. The cold fat rain smacked their faces and pattered in the grass at their feet. Tabitha recognised the lay of the land; they must’ve been getting close to home-cave by now. She wondered if this was a good time to ask Sea Mist about the demons, or the invaders, whatever they were. She wondered if it was widely known, or if Stone Shore was covering the whole thing up as heresy.

‘Hey,’ said Tabitha, stopping to rest. Sea Mist wandered back. ‘Do you know anything about any... demons? Has Deep Roots told you?’ As Tabitha dropped the bundle of fish to sign her words, Sea Mist grabbed her arm. She stared at her, frozen in fear.

‘What’s wrong?’ said Tabitha. She’d never seen the woman look so afraid. Sea Mist put a rough hand over Tabitha’s mouth. She made her leave the fish and dragged her away into the bushes, as something stalked by. The same one-eyed pantherwolf emerged from the trees; it came sniffing over and devoured the fish. Terrified, Sea Mist signed to Tabitha in the bushes to follow her away. Not something she was expected to fight, clearly. They crept away soundlessly in the wind-rustling bushes, as the massive animal quickly finished off their morning’s catch. Huge hungry breaths, sniffing the scent of more on the wind. Tabitha realised then how much she smelled of fish. She frantically covered her hands and arms with mud to hide the scent. The pantherwolf burst through the bushes and pounced on her, crushing her into the dirt. Terrified, Sea Mist pulled her knife on it; she didn’t get chance to strike before the beast batted her aside. The thunderstorm broke fierce and heavy overhead. Tabitha screamed as the beast bit her hand, her head, before she clawed its blind eye and scrambled away. Sea Mist dragged herself up, watching in horror. Blinking against her streaming blood, Tabitha yelled and beat the pantherwolf wildly. She leapt its swipe and darted in to stab its neck, before it could attack Sea Mist. Ducked its bite and grabbed its fur. Laid into its big head and shocked it in a smoking flurry of sparks. When it bit into her leg Tabitha screamed so loud that two of the tribe looked up from their work in the forest, and came running. Arrived just in time to see the red-hair punch a full-grown wolf on the snout and take its gouging bite in her shoulder; screaming as it forced her brutally into the mud in the pouring rain. The lightning struck above; thunder filled the world. Yelling in agony, helpless as the beast swiped the others back with bloody wounds, Tabitha crawled for her life in the dirt. Suddenly she was pinned under its leaping paws; two impossible columns of muscle that crushed her shoulders and forced her to breathe mud. When Sea Mist struck with her knife the beast clamped its jaws on her arm and threw her screaming into the dirt; she lay cowering in bloody fear. The man with the axe it clawed savagely, and bit the second as he tried to drag Tabitha away; driving them back bleeding. The beast turned back on Tabitha struggling under its huge paws and bit into her shoulder; she screamed and raised her sparking hands. Twisted and gripped it in mortal terror, and shocked it in a white-flash boom. Tabitha staggered up bleeding and knifed the snarling smoking monster in the neck. Dodged its claws to grab its shoulder and shock it until it shook. Clawed at its eye in a murderous rage. The bastard kept jerking and turning; it threw her away. Tabitha was straight back in with a crack on its nose. It bit her hand and dragged her down screaming; she shocked its snout in a cinder-cloud bang. Leapt its shoulder to grip its shaggy-furred back as it turned. Lightning split the black storm overhead as Sea Mist and the tribespeople watched in horror. Tabitha screamed murderous and sliced the pantherwolf’s big head with her claws. Gripped a neck muscle thicker than her thigh and shocked it screaming with every volt in her. Electrified the shuddering beast until it roared wildly, flames rippling in its fur, and her current bled out dry. The thing reared and snarled and tossed her in the dirt; it half-pounced to kill her. It backed away suddenly from her sparking claws, that vicious burning sting, and the wounded people she protected. A faint pinprick glow behind her eyes.

‘Come on!’ she screamed wildly, a silver bloody mess, staggering to her feet. ‘Fight me! Come on!’ It backed away, circled furiously, and wouldn’t come back at those sparking claws. Watching coldly. Suddenly it disappeared into the forest. Wounds streaming, Tabitha dropped. She staggered frantically in the mud and the pounding rain to reach the others where they lay.

‘Sea Mist? Are you alright?’ she said desperately, clutching her tight, looking into her friend’s frightened eyes.

Sea Mist nodded; she looked into the eyes of a woman possessed. The red-mane was gouged and bloody all over; she shouldn’t be alive. Half her cheek was missing, slick with gleaming blood. Covered in deep wounds that would drop the strongest in the tribe, and healing before her eyes. The newcomer stared back, wild and fire-eyed; her curls dripped the rain. A bloody demon, born in the raging storm. Sea Mist watched the red-mane sigh, and smile, and drop down bleeding in the mud. She screamed to the others to help the woman. Clutching her own bloody arm, Sea Mist staggered to her feet. She watched red-haired Deer being dragged back to home-cave in a trail of silver blood, as the fierce storm beat down. Except, Deer wasn’t Deer any more. She’d driven away a full-grown wolf. Spirit-born? There was no doubt in her mind. The red-mane had earned her naming, and far more besides. She’d saved her life.

‘This outsider came to us like a child,’ Stone Shore addressed the tribe that night, as they stood around the blazing hearthfire. Tabitha and Sea Mist sat together beside Deep Roots, watching in silence. ‘Today, she saved the life of one of our own.’ The people sounded their approval in whoops and barking shouts, like wild dogs. Tabitha felt a sudden rising in her chest at their words, though she didn’t know what they meant.

‘I did not like this woman when she appeared in our home,’ Stone Shore continued. ‘I do not like her still. She has witch’s ways.’ Some in the crowd muttered among themselves; still uncertain of the red-haired sorceress. ‘But that does not mean I have no respect for her, after what she did today,’ he said gravely. ‘She fought, fiercely, to protect Sea Mist. For our own flesh and blood, this stranger fought the most terrible foe we know. And drove it away with her fury.’ The crowd yelled and barked. ‘It is as Deep Roots says,’ Stone Shore called out. ‘She has hunted and put food in our bellies. She has lived as one of us. And already she would die, fiercely, to protect one of our own.’ A heartfelt howl in the crowd sent a shiver down Tabitha’s spine.

‘To fight fiercely, without fear, and lay down her life for her sister... I could ask no more of anyone here!’ Stone Shore told the tribe. Raging Flame nodded sternly in the crowd. ‘First Ancestor himself could ask nothing more!’ Stone Shore continued. ‘This day, by every measure, this woman has earned her name.’ The crowd howled altogether; the sound reverberated on the huge cave walls. Tabitha wished to god she could understand their deep rough words, it gave her such a feeling in her chest.

‘Sea Mist,’ said Stone Shore, turning to her where she sat. ‘Will you name this woman?’

‘I will,’ Sea Mist told the tribe, cradling her bound arm as she got to her feet.

‘And do you name her before the spirit of First Ancestor, that she will be Found and live always in Fierce-Hope?’

‘I do,’ Sea Mist replied solemnly, staring into the hearthfire’s flames. Recalling the hardships of First Ancestor, and how he united all.

‘Then name this woman,’ Stone Shore commanded in his booming voice, stepping back to give her the crowd.

‘I name this woman, who saved my life!’ Sea Mist cried out passionately, her tears coming, her voice echoing in the caves. Giving true life to her friend. The tribe whooped and barked, clapping and beating their chests. ‘Before First Ancestor, I name her!’ Sea Mist called to the tribe. ‘Born bloody and wrathful in the jaws of beasts, I name her! In fierce battle under lightning skies, I name her Dark Storm!’

‘Dark Storm!’ the tribe roared; a sudden booming tide.

Hey, you, said Deep Roots happily, tapping Tabitha on the shoulder. You. Name.

‘I’ve been given a name now?’ she replied cluelessly under all the shouting, looking into his kind smiling eyes. He was nodding. After some quick charades until she had his meaning right, Tabitha realised that the people were waiting for her to stand up. Half covered in crude bandages, Tabitha hobbled up and looked out at the crowd beyond the hearthfire. They were waiting for her to say something, but she didn’t know any words. She didn’t know any rituals. She was just glad Sea Mist was alright. When she limped over to her friend and hugged her tight, smiling and wordless, the tribe whooped and cheered at all they needed to see. His hard eyes seeming kinder than usual, Stone Shore stepped forward to finish the ceremony and recite the prayer. To make Dark Storm one of their own.

‘Rise up! Rise up and shout!’ he called to the crowd over the crackling sacred flames, just as he did for every naming. The tribe were whooping and barking; calling her name. ‘Raise your voices, for First Ancestor to hear! Let your hearts and voices give your sister Fierce-Hope, the all-strength and the deep-wisdom, all the days of her life!’ the people cheered and called in the fire-lit night. ‘The First Ancestor walked in endless winter!’ Stone Shore bellowed, echoing through the caves.

‘He found Lost Spirits weeping on every hill and shore!’ the tribe called back.

‘With holy hands he struck the first flame in the darkness!’ Sea Mist joined in.

‘He taught Fierce-Hope, the Ancient Way, as they gathered round!’ the crowd finished.

‘She who stands before you is no Lost Spirit,’ Stone Shore called out, beckoning Tabitha forward to lay his heavy hand on her shoulder. ‘This woman is your sister. This woman is Dark Storm!’

21

Tabitha woke the next day to an entirely different tribe. As she stretched and wandered out into the vast cave clearing, people actually asked how she was. Signed and gestured to ask if she was healing well, and if they could do anything for her. Asked if she needed a certain paste of herbs to help with the pain, or if they could help her up to the hot pools to bathe. They’d been nothing but frosty with her until now, as if she’d never really belong. Now that she’d crossed the threshold though, and had a name, the tribe were loyal to a fault.

‘I’m ok, but thank you,’ she told an old woman pleasantly, who was urging fresh bark-looking bandages on her. Tabitha was pretty sure the woman was Green Shoot, though she could have been Clear Pool. She couldn’t remember everyone’s names. The offer of being helped up to the natural hot pools on the high terrace though, under the vast hole in the cavern roof and the rising dawn above... well, how could she refuse?

She could’ve died right now, the hot water felt so blissful on her stiff muscles. Her deep healing wounds had stopped smarting; she’d been offered a root to chew as she was helped to the volcanic bath and left in peace. The root made her feel high, contented; her mind floated pleasantly.

Soaking in the eggy sulphur-smell of the hot springs, she could see the whole tribe and their homes, spread out below, through the rising steam. Many people had the cleaning bug today, brooming out their sleeping spaces with thick handfuls of wiry twigs. Smoking their caves out for pale bugs, and brushing out the hanging hides for any stray maggots, all of which were good eating. Any mothbird or fishpenguin they brought back was butchered and worked for food, clothes and tools. Watching the tribe live their lives, and seeing Stone Shore beat a younger male for daring to eat breakfast first, Tabitha couldn’t help but take an outside stance. The tribe was hard and a little savage, to be sure. They praised brute strength above all else. But she knew the reason; she’d seen it herself. In this wild world, the instinct to obey the strongest made total sense. With the challenges they faced every day, just to find food, following the rule of strength was their best option for survival. Strength was currency in this primal world; ancient insurance. The stronger their leader, the more direction in their community. The more disciplined their young; the more co-operative their new adults. Hard brutal leadership, for a hard brutal way of life. She couldn’t truly resent Stone Shore for his iron-fisted approach, even if she did want to lay him out with a few on the jaw. He was the perfect product of his time. Were things really all that bad under his rule, if she didn’t go out of her way to rock the boat? Still; those were big thoughts, for another time and place. Right now was a time for no thoughts, as Deep Roots had put it one morning after breakfast.

‘I could get used to this,’ she sighed lazily, lying back against the hot slimy pond-scum rocks at her back. It really did feel like there was a fire beneath her in the water; that lava flowed just a few feet below. She’d never felt so wild and raw and comfortable at the same time. The cold winter wind on her cheeks and bare shoulders contrasted beautifully with the hot-bath feel of the water that eased her aches. If this was a regular part of life in the tribe, then she could happily live out her days in this cave. At least here she had friends.

‘Seven,’ she mumbled, opening her eyes, struck with sudden guilt. ‘Fishbowl.’ Were they ok? What the hell had happened to them?

‘I need to talk to you,’ she urged Deep Roots after her bath, as her catsuit sealed up and fitted itself to her body. Wringing her cold, wet, sulphur-smelling hair against her shoulder. ‘I need to get my friends back now, do you understand?’ she said, stopping him in his tracks. The old man looked concerned for her, but he shrugged and shook his head to say he didn’t understand her words.

‘My bird spirit,’ she reminded him, joining her hands to make a flapping bird. ‘Did you speak to Barkless Tree? After what we talked about?’ Bloody hell. I really need to learn their language. Suddenly there were sounds of panic around them. People running back into the cave clearing from the entrance in the rock wall. They looked terrified; pointing and chattering fearfully about something going on outside. Deep Roots followed Tabitha to the entrance, trying to talk to her and pull her back.

‘It’s ok, I only want to look,’ she told him, hoping she could do something to help. He was opening out his hand to her; shaking his head as he spoke. Desperately trying to get her to stay inside the caves.

‘It’s fine, honestly,’ she objected, gently pulling her forearm from his rough hands. As she resisted him, she could see her strength start to wear him out with the effort. Begging her, Deep Roots lost his grip and watched her go, his face filled with concern.

‘What’s that sound?’ Tabitha mumbled quietly, as she headed through the dark passageway to the forest outside. More of the tribe were calling to her; urging her to come back inside away from it. She ignored them and wandered on through the rock tunnel. Stepping outside, she watched the sky as the strange noise grew louder. There was a sudden rumbling shadow overhead; a huge alien ship unlike anything she’d ever seen. Gleaming white and electric blue. Sweeping wings, like a boomerang. Glowing engines shaking the ground and churning treetops as it roared overhead. Armoured troops manned giant guns in open side doors, their masked eyes glowing; square antennas jutted from their helmets like horns. Tabitha stared in shock. Everything Deep Roots had warned her about, brought to life before her eyes. Before she could creep further out to see where the ship was flying, Deep Roots’ tough hand gripped her arm and dragged her roughly back through the tunnel.

‘Hey, easy!’ she objected, his strong grip hurting her arm. When he pulled her back into the light of the caves though, it wasn’t Deep Roots. It was Stone Shore, yelling furiously in her face.

‘I don’t know what you’re saying!’ she told him, trying to reason with him. He was just shouting her down; spit flying in her face on his foul breath. Backing away, she looked to Deep Roots in the growing crowd; Stone Shore’s lackeys were holding him back. Before she even looked back at Stone Shore, her cheek was an aching agony. He’d hit her, hard. I will fucking kill you.

‘I wanted to see what was out there!’ she yelled at him furiously, trying her best to resist hitting him back. ‘You’re acting like it’s my fault those bloody ships are here!’ Just then she was aware of a change in the tribe; a hush fell over them. They were all looking to the passageway behind her. Someone had walked in; an outsider who prompted no end of quiet chatter. A dark-furred wanderer, afraid for his life.

‘Barkless Tree!’ Stone Shore bellowed angrily, shoving Tabitha aside to pace a circle around him. ‘What did I tell you, Barkless Tree?’ the king snarled menacingly, mocking his name.

‘That you would kill me if you saw me again,’ the stranger replied. ‘I didn’t forget. I only returned to see if the demons had left my people safe.’

‘Demons!’ Stone Shore yelled back, for the benefit of the watching crowd. ‘And what would you know about these demons!? Maybe you brought them here, no? What do you have to say for yourself before I kill you, outcast?’

‘That you’re an idiot with no hold on your temper,’ Barkless Tree shot back. Stone Shore snarled furiously. ‘I came here to tell you that the Death of the World is on us, whether you would have it or not!’ The tribe was panic-stricken; Tabitha just wished she could understand what was being said. This dark visitor... was this the one Deep Roots had spoken to, out in the clearing?

‘The demons, where are they nesting?’ Deep Roots asked the outcast anxiously, ignoring Stone Shore’s wrathful stare. ‘Do you know?’

‘On the shores of the White Sea,’ Barkless Tree replied. ‘By the swiftness of their star-boats, not a day’s journey from here.’

‘I will not hear it!’ Stone Shore bellowed, bringing all his great frame to bear on the outsider. ‘Speaking of these demons will welcome them in! Nothing more!’ he told the crowd. ‘Our silence is our protection, for as long as we trust in First Ancestor!’

‘You have to face them!’ Tabitha called out, guessing at their argument. Stepping into the centre of the clearing to make herself heard. All eyes were on her; the tribe mumbling to understand what she said. ‘Deep Roots, help me,’ she said, signing that demons, not, leave. Deep Roots translated to the rest of the tribe; they spat at her idea that the demons were here to stay. That worship and Fierce-Hope wouldn’t save them. In sudden horror Tabitha realised that Stone Shore was marching over to the outcast to put a stop to this. To kill him where he stood talking, his back turned. Tabitha sprinted for them and punched Stone Shore on the jaw, just before he could knife the poor bastard in the back. Stone Shore turned on her furiously. Tackled her to the ground and hit her hard, straddling her with all his great muscular weight. Evidently hitting the alpha was kind of taboo. When Stone Shore raised his knife on her, Tabitha knew this wasn’t just a very physical argument. He really was about to kill her. Gasping, she swerved her head aside as Stone Shore stabbed the dirt. Again. Struggling against his brute strength, she freed a hand and cracked him on the jaw. Gripped his arm and shot voltage. Stone Shore roared and leapt aside.

‘Leave me alone before I kill you, you stubborn bastard!’ Tabitha screamed at him in a rage. When he came at her she dodged the knife and laid into him. Cracked him on the jaw, again and again; dropped him to his knees. She gripped his reaching arm to electrocute him; stunned him and stepped away into the clearing. Gave him some space as the big male dropped to his hands and knees, growling in pain. Deep Roots was yelling and reaching for Tabitha to help her; others were holding him back. But Stone Shore wasn’t about to stay down. Fur smoking, the brute got to his feet. Growled at her savagely and came charging in again. Tabitha leapt aside and swung a punch as he stumbled past. Why wasn’t anyone breaking them up? Why wasn’t the outsider helping her? He was the reason she’d started this bloody fight, she’d saved his life! But no one helped. No one stepped in. The rocky clearing was ringed with the howling tribe; barking and yelling and cheering the fight. Primal calls in the fire-lit gloom. Tabitha glanced around and saw nothing but wild eyes and bared fangs. Frightened children and cheering elders.

‘Stop him, for god’s sake!’ she screamed at them. ‘I’ll kill him!’ But they were just barking and whooping; egging them both on. Sea Mist and Deep Roots now too; what the hell was going on? Deep Roots looked wild. He was yelling at her to fight, as if there was no other way now. Their alpha sprinted back at her. Stone Shore cracked her with a running-jump punch that jerked her head; knocked her sideways as he jogged past victoriously and slowed to a circling walk. Shouting raw taunts and whipping up the cheering tribe. He ran back and gripped her throat hard to strangle her; she shocked him away. Tabitha staggered back in a painful daze; felt like she’d been hit by a freight train. He rounded on her and swiped his blunt claws; cut her cheek as she dodged away. Punched her hard on the jaw before she could sidestep. Teeth clenched, staring murder, Tabitha lashed out. Leapt screaming and clawed his head in a fly of blood and fur, barely missing his wild eyes. Cracked him on the snout and slashed his arm as he stumbled aside. He staggered; she weaved in and kicked his knee from under him. As he went down she gripped his throat and shocked him. Harder. The cheering tribe yelled and screamed in fright when they saw him smoking and shaking with the witch’s magic.

‘Stop, before I damage you,’ she growled in his big bleeding face, electrocuting him. He was staring, foaming at the mouth, helpless in her grip. Jerking and paralysed as the volts crackled through him. The crowd was yelling and yelping at the dark magic. The stink of burning fur filled Tabitha’s head as his body smoked and juddered. For a second she saw nothing but a whipped dog she was torturing; big frightened eyes staring at her in a wordless plea. Suddenly horrified at herself, Tabitha let go. Instantly his murderous mask came back though; all the pride and fear and macho hate of the pack alpha returned to his stare. Tabitha was ready for it; she’d been watching for it. That killer instinct. No hesitation. She shocked him again; dropped him. And suddenly, glancing around at the tribe’s angry stares, she understood. They expected fights like this; conflict was their way of life. Despite their kindness to her, they understood violence too. This wasn’t a people that would tolerate weakness. She had this one moment to prove herself to them. To show her strength. Clearly their alpha wouldn’t stop fighting until he’d worn her out and ripped her head from her shoulders. If she wanted to go on living here – if she wanted to go on living at all – then she couldn’t afford to show anything less in return. She wrapped both hands around his thick throat and shot him with voltage, jerking his body. Pushed current into him until his eyes flickered and flames danced through his fur. When she let go he dropped like a sack, limp and unconscious.

Tabitha looked around at the silent staring crowd; they were waiting for Stone Shore to get back up. Lost in sudden confusion over who was in charge. Only Deep Roots and Sea Mist were cheering her; the dark outsider too. Yelps and barks grew into growls and snarls among the rest. The tribe looked like they wanted to kill her. Suddenly Deep Roots came forward quickly and knelt at her feet. He bowed his head like she was royalty; submitting. He raised an old reaching hand towards her in a primal display, and stared at the ground. When Sea Mist and the dark newcomer came forward from the quieting crowd, and knelt before her too, Tabitha tried to back away. But she felt Deep Roots subtly grab her hand and hold her there. She tried to pull away.

This can’t be happening. Raging Flame followed, walking over to kneel before her. More followed. None of the kneelers dared look at her; she watched as more in the crowd avoided her eyes and looked to the ground. Shuffling forward silently, like monks in prayer, to kneel at her feet.

What the hell is going on? Tabitha asked herself in shock, looking around at the kneeling tribe in the heavy silence. What do they want? Some were glancing at Stone Shore, beaten and sprawled unconscious beside her, to see if he’d stir and things would go back to the way they were. He was breathing, but he didn’t move. The strongest of them, their alpha, had lost the fight. She was strongest. She was alpha now.

Tabitha looked around with creeping dread as the whole tribe knelt at her feet. Deep Roots still had his hand outstretched to hers; he was still knelt and staring at the sandy ground. She didn’t know what to do. Touch his hand, she supposed. Approve of his presence? Allow him to exist? That kind of thing? Weirded out, Tabitha touched his fingers uncertainly. Deep Roots nodded and backed away reverently, and two more crammed in to offer their hands in turn. Tabitha touched more fingers; a sea of furry clawed hands around her. Like she had to approve them or something. Deep Roots meanwhile was growling and grunting to the growing crowd of the approved, as they surrounded her like an audience. Tabitha couldn’t understand their words. One of the tribe shouted angrily and refused to kneel.

‘This witch cannot be queen! This is heresy!’ one of Stone Shore’s retainers growled furiously.

‘I’ve lived with this outsider!’ Deep Roots told the crowd in answer. ‘She isn’t one of the demons, in their flying ships. She doesn’t have their look, or their way.’

‘We don’t know where she comes from!’ said a female in the crowd uncertainly. ‘How can she be queen?’

‘She comes from Sacred Mountain,’ Deep Roots replied, full of conviction. ‘She rode here on a great bird spirit.’

‘A bird spirit?’ said the dark outcast, Barkless Tree. Suddenly fascinated.

‘But how do you know this?’ said a young male. ‘How are you sure?’

‘Like I said, she knows the painted words,’ Deep Roots explained. ‘The spirit language of the ancestors. She told me how she came here. There was no lie in her words.’

‘But she’s a sorceress!’ said another in the crowd. ‘You saw it yourself!’

‘But also Spirit-born,’ Deep Roots countered. ‘Can she not be both?’

‘Well, all who know the painted words come from the Great Spirit,’ a mother reasoned in the crowd, holding her child in her arms. An ancient truth.

‘And all who come from the Great Spirit have Tribe-Right,’ an older male added, finishing their oldest law.

‘She won the King Fight in the Ancient Way,’ Deep Roots told them. ‘She is strongest. For the good of the tribe, she must lead. It has always been this way. Her rule cannot be questioned.’

‘I question it!’ Stone Shore growled savagely, staggering to his feet across the clearing. All the tribe’s eyes were on him as he spoke sacrilege. ‘I deny her name! She is a witch, a deceiver! She is Death come among us! You will see it!’ With that he limped away from the silent staring crowd back to his cave, head pounding and flesh stinging from her magic.

‘Wait,’ Tabitha protested, as Deep Roots led her to the rocky throne beyond the hearthfire. ‘Wait, I don’t want this,’ she told him, trying to be as clear as she could. ‘I’m not one of your tribe,’ she said, shaking her head with her hands out in protest. Deep Roots just smiled, trying to coax her into the seat she’d won by fair combat.

‘Look, I’m interfering with your way of life,’ she tried to explain. ‘I don’t have any right to lead you. I’m not even part of your race!’ Deep Roots seemed to understand her signs, and just shook his head; shrugged and signed dismissively.

‘There’s a good strong spirit in you,’ he told her, and wished she could understand. ‘It doesn’t matter what shape you are.’

‘I can’t lead you,’ Tabitha replied softly, shaking her head. Looking into his saddening old eyes. Pushing past him gently. She edged through the mumbling crowd towards the tunnel in the rock wall. ‘I-I’m not one of you. This is wrong,’ she told them. With that, she turned away from Deep Roots’ lost expression. Turned away from the confused crowd, calling to her. Beckoning her back. I’m messing with their evolution, Tabitha realised, struck with guilt. She pulled away from Sea Mist, shaking her head, as the woman ran to grab her hand.

‘I’m sorry,’ she told her sadly. I’ve done enough harm already. I should never have come to this world. Tabitha took one last look at the tribe before she ducked down into the tunnel. Left them standing there, confused and leaderless, as she walked out sadly through the trees.

Tabitha hurried back through the forest for the lakeshore, stamping down her fresh grief, and knew she’d made the best decision. It wasn’t right to interfere with a civilisation like this; especially one so primal. The more she thought about it, even the slightest outside influence could change this people’s entire future. But... what about the ship that she’d seen passing over? Did it belong to this world, or another? What did they want here?

‘Ok, think,’ she told herself in a panic, breathing deep and standing still in the forest. Gulping in her dry throat. ‘You’ve interfered enough. Find Seven and Fishbowl, and don’t get involved. Just get away from this world.’

Stopping to catch her breath on a hill, Tabitha could just make out the turquoise lake, beyond the forest in the far distance. Towering beyond that, the dark fearsome peak they called Sacred Mountain. She’d intended to have a guide or two when she climbed that bloody mountain again. That wasn’t an option any more. There was only one thing to do now: disappear.

Don’t do any more damage than you already have, she told herself. Find Seven and Fishbowl, and leave.

22

On a far distant world, the eight-foot aquatic creature came around in a big water tank, cradled in a plastic hospital bed. Am I dead? He wondered. Is this the After?

‘How are you feeling?’ came a voice through a speaker. The creature looked around in sudden shock; saw that there were two land-dwellers on the other side of the glass. A man and a woman. He was big and blue and reptilian; she was slight and green. He was still alive, probably because of them. Under their watch now, or a slave to them. Or, possibly, they were a healer and a lawmaker. The reptilian man had that lawmaker look.

‘Do you speak Trade Language?’ the woman asked him slowly, through the speaker. The creature could only stare through the glass and guess at what she was saying.

‘Not a problem,’ the reptilian man replied, smiling. ‘AI, translate please.’

‘Translating,’ came a synthetic voice; an artificial intelligence. A screen flickered to life beside them, and another screen on the creature’s side of the glass. He drifted up painfully from his hospital bed to study its words.

‘Do you understand me now?’ said the reptilian lawmaker, waiting for the computer to translate in guttural sonar inside the tank. The aquatic giant listened and replied with a grunt; short and bad-tempered.

‘Yes,’ the screen translated outside.

‘Sir, what happened to you was deeply traumatic,’ said the female healer, dressed in close white clothes. The creature listened to the translation.

‘No shit,’ he replied, rubbing his eyes and sighing bubbles. He couldn’t get the sight of his dying family from his mind. Couldn’t forget their screams.

‘We’re very sorry for your loss,’ said the woman. ‘What happened to them was... barbaric.’

‘It’s our law,’ the creature replied, hearing his words translated outside the tank.

‘Well... fortunately there are other laws, on other worlds,’ the man replied, as the screen translated his words.

‘You saved my life. Why?’ the creature rumbled.

‘Well, because we could,’ the healer replied, surprised at the question. ‘It’s our duty.’

‘We believe in second chances,’ the lawmaker added.

‘You should have left me to die,’ the creature shot back. ‘That’s our law. Why didn’t you leave me to die!?’

‘It’s our duty to protect and preserve the life of Ministry citizens,’ the healer explained, taken aback by the creature’s anger. ‘Would you have preferred to die?’

‘Of course I would’ve preferred to die!’ the creature bellowed, his booming voice echoing on the glass wall. ‘I brought dishonour on my shoal and caused the death of my family! I can never return to my world!’

‘But what about a new life, on a new world?’ the lawmaker replied. ‘What about the chance to live again, and, ah... bring new honour to your name?’

‘To live on in a glass tank like a pet!?’ the thing roared. ‘What honour is there in that!?’ The pair of land dwellers cast a look at one another. The lawmaker took a deep breath.

‘We’ve... started a new program, for casualties of culture just like yourself,’ said the lawmaker. ‘It’s... not easy,’ he continued. ‘But it is a chance for a new life. Will you hear us out?’

‘...Speak,’ the creature replied, after a long silence. The lawmaker prattled on about a new life and new work. New opportunities and a fresh start, and happiness. Then the healer prattled on about procedures and warnings and considerable psychological implications and did he understand.

‘Yes,’ he replied sternly, dead inside. He was here now; no changing that. No going back. He couldn’t take his own life and bring yet more shame on his family. He just couldn’t. He’d rot in the five hells forever. So, these land-dwellers. They were going to change him, they explained. Give him a job. Solid work, with his hands, until he got used to things and used to land and could climb a career ladder if he chose to, whatever the fuck a ladder was. They prattled on again about how good a decision he was making and how he’d never look back. When the screen finished translating their prattling words, the huge creature shrugged.

‘Fine,’ he replied.

‘And you understand the potential implications of this decision, and that the Ministry Amphibious Peoples Reallocation Program, and all parties involved, will in no way be held liable for any future potential repercussions of the aforementioned medical procedure?’ the lawmaker rattled off, searching his expression through the thick glass.

‘Fine,’ he repeated.

‘Outstanding,’ said the lawmaker, sharing a smile with the healer. ‘You won’t regret this decision, my friend. It’s your chance for a new life in the Ministry.’

‘Fine,’ the creature growled again, slamming his fist on the glass. He would’ve killed himself if he could. But... no more dishonour. He couldn’t return to his world now; he couldn’t stay in this tank either. If this was the only way to reclaim some shred of honour, through good hard work, there was no choice to make.

‘If you could just press your hand to the screen there my friend, it’ll take your hand print as a signature and we can get started,’ said the lawmaker. The creature slammed its huge palm flat against the screen until the thing beeped and blinked green.

‘We’ll begin the procedure just as soon as we can,’ the healer told him happily. ‘In the meantime, please just try to relax.’ She put a hand on the glass, and smiled to him. She seemed like a gentle soul, now that he studied her. She didn’t mean him harm; just wanted to help. ‘Personally, I think you’re making one of the best decisions of your life,’ she told him happily, waiting for the screen to translate. ‘Welcome back.’

Hours later the creature woke up struggling and suffocating, lost in shock. He – he wasn’t in water. He’d die. Gasping great gillfuls of air desperately, he suddenly realised that he didn’t have gills. They’d been cut out of him; stitched up. He had... he had... air gills. He could feel them swelling inside him, strange and sore. The incisions in his neck were agony when he moved his head to look around the gleaming white ward. He’d never seen anywhere so clean. So... dry.

‘It’s alright,’ the healer said soothingly beside him; the same skinny green female with the kind smile. He stared at her; tried to take in her strange words and how unaquatic they sounded now. Tried to steady his shaking hands. The screen beside the oversized bed translated for them.

‘Once you’ve recovered we’re going to take you to an orientation centre, do you know what that is?’ she said kindly. Waiting for the AI screen to translate.

‘No,’ the creature rumbled quietly. The screen translated his word. Not even his words sounded right any more. They were clunky; airy. All wrong.

‘Everything will be a shock at first, but you’re perfectly safe,’ the healer reassured him, patting his giant hand. Smiling gently, with those stark eyes. ‘We’re going to take you to a place where you can get used to life out of water. You can stay there as long as you need to, and then when you feel ready, we’ll find you a home. And a good job. But all in good time. For now though, please just rest.’ The huge creature just stared at her; stared around the ward and felt sick. The bright white space spun around him as he blacked out on the bed.

23

Tabitha watched the blonde grass shiver in the wind around her hard black feet. The grey mountain was looming close now, filling her view. She’d come through the forest into the foothills. Found more of those strange vampire flowers, and cut a few to tuck in her belt. She doubted if Seven and Fishbowl were even alive now, it’d been so long.

Earth didn’t kill us, she reminded herself. This world won’t either. Flexing her fingers, feeling her heartcore hum, Tabitha squinted at the pale sun in the white-gold winter sky. She walked on, and hoped. Dreamt of finding her monsters, and other worlds to see.

Further on by the shale slopes she watched a speckled deer grazing from a distance; it hadn’t seen her. Suddenly there were squidlizards racing for it. Chasing it down as it fled in panic; nipping its legs as it called in fear. A bite. A stumble. When it fell they mobbed it, biting its neck and dragging it to the ground. Tabitha’s first instinct was to shout and run them off... but what gave her the right to interfere? Everything had to eat. For the deer, life was run or die. For the squidlizards, it was kill or starve. The wild didn’t judge one or the other; just favoured the stronger. Tabitha looked away from the violent scene, left the pack to their kill, and felt glad it wasn’t her.

She pressed on for the mountain slopes deep in thought. The best adapted, and fought and killed to carry on living. Surviving this world came down to one rule: dominate, or die. She wasn’t ready to die yet; this mountain was there to be beaten. Sighing out the aches in her muscles, Tabitha rolled her stiff shoulders and started the climb.

How long had it taken now, to get this high? Every step up the slope was so steep it made her calves ache. She heard nothing around her; not even the mothbirds’ familiar trill. Only the bitter wind, rushing in her pink ears. Up above, the mountain’s great height was wreathed in ragged cloud, like the stone heart of a storm.

‘Come on,’ she said breathlessly, dragging her feet on up the slope.

The light was fading when she reached the first frosts; the endless gold forest spread like a carpet far below. Her breaths were tumbling mist. Her legs were killing her. Another hour or so and it’d be nightfall; she really didn’t want to climb the mountain blind again. Sighing, looking up along the ridge, she saw a flatter clearing way up ahead. Took a deep cold breath in the stinging air, and carried on up the slope.

Tabitha reached the wider clearing gasping for breath; a flat expanse with crowded pines by a rocky pool. The air was quickly growing colder. The gloomy mountain summit far above... well, she could hardly even see it through the clouds. In her limited experience as a mountaineer, she believed that the correct term for such a distance was Really Fucking Far. She wasn’t getting any further tonight; the sun had already set over the distant peaks. The sky was a thin strip of final fiery orange on the jagged horizon. Fading up through every blue there was into deep black night above her, as the stars appeared one by one.

She felt her fear descending, the darkness came on so quickly. Had to get some shelter going before she couldn’t see a bloody thing. Walking on stiffly for the trees nearby, she pulled a wilted vampire flower from her belt and planted the rest in the soil before they died. Planting the first flower among the trees for shelter, she nicked her arm and let it drink her silver blood. Watched its stem blush black as it renatured, and fed her current into it. Creaking, rustling, it grew gradually to a tall glowing bloom. Feeding it current, she shaped it as it grew. Angled a branch down into a growing strut, and pushed it into the cold hard soil. She did the same with more branches around the trunk, until she had the small crooked frame of a teepee. Quickly pulled more growing shoots to wrap it in a messy web, walling her shelter off against the wind. Pushing her current into a dead pine branch, she set a campfire burning and circled it with stones. With a weary grunt she finally sat down in the small doorway, and let the gorgeous heat of the flames warm her bones.

Feeding the crackling fire for the night, Tabitha finished growing her nest inside the shelter. Huddled down tight inside against the cold black wild. Sighed uncomfortably, and tried to get some sleep.

Tabitha woke with a jump. There was a snap, out beyond the fire. She shot up to peer from the tiny doorway, her stomach twisting with dread. Tightened her grip on the knife; a tiny creaking in the silence. Outside, a single staring eye reflected the flames in the distant dark. Her very own angel of death. Tabitha leapt from the shelter as the pantherwolf bounded out of the night and threw its massive weight at it with a timber crunch. She snatched a flaming stick from the fire and beat it screaming; orange sparks flying with scorching thumps on its snarling head. The thing growled and jumped back with the rancid stink of burnt fur. Tabitha ran at it and clawed its huge head, driving the animal back into the clearing on the mountainside.

‘You’re not, fucking, killing me!’ she yelled fiercely, forcing it away across the clearing with guttering sweeps of the burning torch. Backed it right up against the cliff edge as it shrank from the flames, and swung her knife. Staggering fearfully at the edge, the cornered pantherwolf pounced. A split-second dread where time crawled and Tabitha watched the giant beast jump at her, airborne; massive claws splayed and stark eye staring wild. The thing slammed into her like a ton-weight. Her world tumbled in its hard flying bear-hug; she flew weightless and smashed into the dirt beneath it. Gasping and struggling, its giant snapping jaws filled her view. Clattered on her panicked outstretched hands; broke a pointed tooth with a crack. Clamped down hard on her arm in searing sudden agony. Screaming, bleeding, Tabitha shocked it back with a sparking bang in the night. Clawed its eye to scramble away and run for the fire. She felt a car crash of fur and muscle smash into her from behind. Screamed in panic when its massive paws pinned her and the hard ground punched her in the face. The beast bit down hard in her shoulder and sat its crushing weight on her like a lion, waiting for her to suffocate and bleed out. Gasping for breath, screaming for her life, Tabitha slammed a hand on its snout and shot every volt in her body. Sank her claws in its flesh and wouldn’t let go. The thing’s heavy snarling breath in her ear was drowned out by a sizzling buzz. A crackling stink of burning fur. Her arm was trembling with the current. She was screaming, suffocating; fighting for life. The animal snarled and pulled away, freeing her; Tabitha kept her claws hooked in its flesh. Pulled painfully to her feet as it dragged her around. It forced her to the ground again and bit into her thigh. Screaming in the dirt, blood streaming, Tabitha sank both clawed hands into its big head where it bit. Yelled and shot scorching volts through its skull. The beast was slowing, its body shaking under her crackling current. It stopped, and trembled, and fell to the ground in stiff spasms with a giant thump. Teeth gritted, Tabitha pounced on it and wouldn’t let go. Screamed until her throat stung and kept forcing crackling volts through its head. Sent frantic lightning scorching through its huge body, until the thing roared and smoked from its snarling mouth like a demon. With a final feral gasp the monster burned and dropped dead on the ground. Wide-eyed, breathless, Tabitha let go weakly and fell back beside it. Clutched her bloody wounds in agony. She stared up at the cold stars in a moment of stunned silence, and blessed relief. Pushed herself up painfully from the freezing ground as her flesh knitted. She staggered round to see the dead pantherwolf; looked over its giant blue-black body and its slick bloody fur. Limp and burned and beautiful. Breathing deep, staring hatefully into its dead eye victoriously, Tabitha burned up with an ancient fury she didn’t understand. Dropped to her knees and laid into its lifeless skull. Thumped and beat and battered its big head like a caveman in a wild yelling frenzy. She clawed its flesh, her fingers coated in blood, and dragged them in glorious stripes down her filthy face. She wanted to feel its dark dripping death on her; she didn’t know why. She wasn’t thinking, and she’d never felt so alive. A staring breathless savage standing over her kill. Pulling her knife, teeth chattering in the bitter cold, she knelt down by the body and skinned it roughly for its fur. Grabbed the corpse and dragged it, snarling and straining at the weight of it, to shove it off the edge and crash down the mountainside.

24

Tabitha woke shivering. Coughed steamy breaths in the freezing air as she climbed from her hut to stretch and yawn. Blinking her yellow eyes wide to wake up, she squinted at the daylight. Pulled her warm smelly furs tight around her. The mountain clearing was blinding white this morning, coated in thick snow. The pool nearby was a rich dull black among the jagged rocks, reflecting a clear cloudless sky. There by the still water, two birds danced slowly. Long-legged and silver; graceful as spirits. Stooping and circling; flexing upright to sway and step as one. Wings spread wide in spiny silverblue fans, bowing to one another in soundless companionship. Tabitha watched in a reverent silence; lost in the moment. Snowflakes flurried past her pink cheeks in the wintry wind.

The sky had turned a dark gloomy grey as she continued the climb. Sleet and hail stung her face in a blinding flurry. She could hardly see three feet in front. There was only the mountain; this was her whole world now. Clawing her way ever upwards, with the constant fear that the same thing would happen again. Those strange somethings hidden away in the rocks, waiting to sting her. Blind her. She shook the thought from her head and crawled on up the jagged rock face. Her legs stung; her arms were burning. She just had to focus. To place every handhold, every footstep, as strongly and carefully as she ever had in her life. Gasped as rocks tumbled down above her, smashing together with a cordite smell and shooting past her head. A dark jagged stone like a golf ball tumbled down and smacked her hard on the forehead.

‘Ahh, fuck!’ she growled through her teeth, clutching to her hand holds, blinking a warm dribble of blood from her eye as it ran down her brow. She couldn’t even free up a hand to clutch her head; just had to wait for the fierce pain to die down and heal. Still the hail pelted her; the ghostly howling wind rushed and whistled in her ears and whipped her hair against her face. A tiny red-haired speck in the mountains, clawing up a vast jagged wall of rock in the storm.

God, how long had she been climbing now? Her arms and legs trembled with the effort of dragging her ever higher. Every time she looked up it was the same; she couldn’t see a thing in the blinding hail and iron-coloured cloud. Just reached out and felt for her next slippery handhold in the sheer slope above her. Frozen faith. Clawed for the rocks and ice above. Gripped hard and pulled herself up.

Do it for your monsters. For your friends. Lightning shot through the stormclouds above her; a colossal vein of light. The thunder that broke and rumbled was deafening in the dark mountains all around her; she could feel it right in her bones. What’d happen if the lightning struck her? Would it supercharge her? Throw her off the mountain completely? It didn’t matter. There was only the climb. For my friends. Wind-whipped in the hail, she clawed with hard shaking hands for that next gap; that next narrow hold. Suddenly something moved under her feet. The ledge of ice beneath her creaked and cracked. Tabitha yelled in panic as the ground gave way; clung on for dear life as the ice fell away beneath her. Dropping forever to smash on the slopes below. She was left holding on desperately with sore shaking arms, yelling in fear. Nothing but the endless drop beneath her dangling feet. Quick panic breaths. Gulping on the freezing air that stung her cold face. Blinking constantly against the flying rain; her hair a whipping wet tangle in the howling wind. She felt a sudden jolt as the rock shuddered and loosened above her, and peeled away noisily from the mountain. Stones and soil crumbling down on her face. Her stomach lurched; rapid breaths in her dry throat. All of a sudden her handhold was breaking away, and her life came down to a single choice. Leap, or fall. Deep breath. Tabitha yelled and strained and launched herself up the rockface; airborne. For the slowest second of her life, she was flying. Clawed hands spread wide and reaching for life as lightning tore the hailstorm sky around her. Caught a desperate gut-wrenching hold of the icy stones above her, as she smacked her face against bare rock. Yelling, hurting, Tabitha kicked her dangling feet desperately into whatever gaps she found. Forced her aching body up the rock face. Felt her heartcore humming and sparking inside her, driving her on. The storm didn’t matter any more, or even the climb. There were only her friends up there, waiting. She hoped. She couldn’t think where else they could be.

I’m getting to the top of this fucking mountain. This was nothing. She was more than this climb. Breath ragged, muscles burning, she refused to let it beat her. Just clawed for that next gap in the ice and rock. That next foothold. Slid her hand into the next small crevice, and bunched her hard fist inside it to anchor herself. Hauled her sore stiff body up. One clawing hand in front of the other on the deafening stormblown peak.

Gasping for breath in the thin frozen air, Tabitha felt blindly for the next handhold in the rock and missed. Patted around up there for a grip. Nothing; it was flat stone. When she looked up, the wall of rock was gone. The top. She grunted and pushed herself up, and suddenly there was a ledge. Dragged her aching body up one last time and collapsed breathless near the peak.

‘...Get up,’ she growled at herself, pushing up on numb shaking muscles. Turned and stared and felt her heartcore quicken at the sight. Out there through the calming storm, the whole world stretched away beneath her. Cold ancient summits and forests in the golden sunlight, so far below that they were nothing but trembling tapestries. A hundred distant jagged peaks, tossing snow flurries into the sky as the wind peeled their summits, and dragged the stormclouds away. Snaking rivers and tumbling falls way down below, bleeding cold silver life through a wild landscape. A whole world, fiercer than myth, stretching away at her feet. Away behind her, Tabitha glimpsed a ghostly glow on the mountain’s higher ground. Seven and Fishbowl must’ve been up there somewhere; they had to be. Taking one last look at the view before she headed on for the summit, Tabitha stopped for a second. She looked out longingly at all that wild arctic beauty, and its clear endless sky; a frozen paradise that wanted her dead. This raw, silent back of beyond.

Higher still, she pushed her way through a grove of crooked trees, their dry branches rattling like firewood. The ground here was marshy; her hard feet cracked the frosty crust and sank in the mud with cold stinking squelches. Here on the peak, with the jagged summit reaching up into the cold clearing sky, she found herself surrounded by vast ribcages. Monumental skulls, half-buried in the soil and weeds; big enough to match the strange skywhales she’d seen when she first arrived on this world. There ahead of her was some bizarre mollusc tree, standing stark and monolithic over an empty clearing. In front of it, something bigger than a bus was wrapped entirely in roots and dirt. When she glimpsed the black bitten tip of its tail though, a cold grey dread crept down her spine.

‘Seven?’ she mumbled, running over to the mound. ‘Seven!’ She ripped frantically at the giant roots that covered him, revealing a patch of his scarred black scales. He wasn’t moving though; was he dead? Tabitha pulled the knife from her belt and sliced the roots in rustling squeaks and snaps. Dragged the tendrils away; scrambled to clear his scales underneath. The vines and branches were covered in tiny teeth; they’d been scrubbing and eating at Seven’s scales, and left them pocked and pitted with acid burns. Furious, Tabitha ran around to his head and pulled the vines frantically from his nose and mouth. As she ripped them away from his closed eyes, and gradually freed his head, she heard him start to breathe again. Massive gulping sniffs, as if he hadn’t drawn breath in years. He was coming around.

‘Seven, it’s me! I’m going to get you out!’ Tabitha told him desperately, tugging at the creaking vines that coated his head. Seven was starting to move again; twitching in his overgrown wrappings. But something else was moving too. Something up behind her. When Tabitha turned around, the gigantic mollusc tree had creaked into life.

25

A thin root shot from the ground and gripped her ankle. Tabitha yelled in shock and tore it loose. Another wrenched her wrist; dragged her towards that giant glowing thing. She pulled her knife and cut the root with a sharp snap, as wiry tendrils crept from the dirt and wrapped her ankles. Her stomach twisting in horror, Tabitha clawed them and wrestled free in the gloomy clearing. Turned away from that sweet eerie glow that made her forget why she was here. Whatever that light was it’d drawn Seven and Fishbowl in, that first night on the shore. Trapped and paralysed; slowly being eaten alive. Gasping, Tabitha cut the twining shoots pulling on her arm and dodged a sudden reaching root. Sliced at coiling vines around her calves and burned them back with the current in her gripping hands. There were more and more growing from the stinking dirt, reaching for her; too quick and too many to cut away. Thickening to ropes and cords before she could struggle out of them and skirt around the clearing. Creaking and coiling like a hundred constrictors to catch and slow her, and pull her screaming to the writhing dirt. She yelled in dread as the tendrils wrapped her throat and crept across her face. Kicking and screaming as the roots pulled her tight to the rot-smelling soil.

‘Get the fuck off me!’ she yelled in panic, struggling and gripping whatever roots she could reach to burn them away with her current. Wrestled her right hand from the smoking vines to grab another that wrapped her wrist. She yelled and forced her current through it, watching hatefully as it smoked and burned; more tendrils crept to cover her eyes. Tabitha screamed and tore her arm from the smoking mesh, and clamped her hand over her face to burn the suffocating shoots away. Strained and struggled, and sank her claws into a thick root. Screamed and shot every volt she had to scorch up its length and burn the monstrous tree itself. The whole thing flinched back; she felt its endless roots stunned for a moment and tore herself from the snapping web. She ran straight for the dimming tree as its tendrils shot after her, and clawed her way blindly up its glowing centre. Yelled and wrestled free from strangling branches and climbed its pulsing trunk. Screaming wild and murderous, she buried her knife deep in its pulsing light-root heart; a woody squelching thump and a burst of shining fluid. Suddenly the whole monstrous thing stopped and sagged, bleeding out. Staring, breathless, Tabitha tore her knife from the tree’s fading heart and jumped down. Walked around it to make sure it was dead. Satisfied, she gave it one last cautious glance and headed back to Seven’s tangled mound to cut him free.

It was painfully slow. Seven was practically shrink-wrapped; every branch and root had to be sawn away. As daylight faded to dusk, Tabitha stopped sawing when she noticed the strange light again. The monstrous tree behind her burned afresh with a cold dead glow, bioluminescent on the night-black peak. Look away. Yes, she had to look away. You need to look away now. Yeah, in a second. I can’t. I can’t look away. Eyes fixed on that ghostly light, she gave up on Seven and came in close. Looked up in strange creeping wonder at that grotesque tree, and touched it. What was... she was sure she should be fighting that light, though somehow she couldn’t bring herself to hurt it. Wait, where was she? The anaesthetic tingle felt like rich bright opium inside her, and nothing else mattered. It reached out; wrapped her in branches of clear squeaking black. She stood showered in its pollen like a fountain of sparks, gripped and bodyvolted by the twisted breathing monolith. Pulled close to its trunk. It was in her head now, sighing ancient wordless lullabies into primal reaches. A dream almost; a drug-rush comahigh like creeping chocolate sleep. A placid vampire vision as its vines pulled silver blood drops out through her skin. She was one with it, coiled and held in leeching stems. Felt the sleep weighing heavy on her, numbed and blissful. Wait... there was something else in her head. A thought, a nearby presence; something furious and colossal...

Seven. She didn’t feel herself pull her knife and stab the thing. It was like Seven had taken her over. When she looked down at what she’d done, its scarred shining heart was cut clean through. The tree shuddered and shook in sudden shock, and shrank back with a huge creaking sag. Slowly sobering, Tabitha pulled her knife free and jumped down. Wiped away the shining fluid that’d sprayed her face when she stabbed it, and spat its bitter taste from her mouth. The tree was shaking; its steady gulps grew short and stuttered. Venom shivers and creaking convulsions. She watched its branches shrink away and wither down, poisoned by her blood, and shrugged off its deathly weight. A new waking dream as she walked away, still high on its light. Her midnight silhouette slid through a deep-starred nightbliss, slick and silky as blueblack liquid glass. She walked to the edge of the summit and stood overlooking the dark lake far below; a shadow breathing tumbling vapour under the cold starry sky.

There’s something I need to do, Tabitha told herself drunkenly, her brow furrowed as she searched her swimming thoughts. Felt her heartcore burning off the anaesthetic.

‘Seven,’ she mumbled, turning around. ‘Seven!’ she yelled, running back to the giant mound of roots. Cutting and clawing frantically at the hard creaking tendrils wrapped around his head, until she could hear his fresh panicked breaths just beneath. ‘Hold on!’ she said, wrenching the branches away with stiff sore arms. Cloudy breaths tumbling from her mouth. At least he could breathe now; she turned her attention to the other shape. The stone-still shrub beside him was Fishbowl, buried in dying tendrils. Tabitha picked and plucked at the vines like giant stitches.

‘I’m here, it’s ok,’ she told the creature gently, pulling the web away. ‘It’s ok.’ Fishbowl was struggling now too, worming its way out like a crumpled squid from a cocoon. Flopping to the dirt, finally free, the creature staggered and wrapped a tentacle tight around her arm, and wouldn’t let go. Tabitha sniffled back her tears quietly and pulled Fishbowl close, fiercely protective, and set back to work freeing Seven. She gripped his snout and dived into his head; ultrasensory. He was in there, somewhere.

Peering into Seven’s mind, wind-whipped in flying pixeldust, Tabitha saw some kind of vision. But it wasn’t the white space of thought she was used to. This was some dim colossal forest sprawled out before her; an inner world of death and decay. Dying nightmare thoughts, like plumes of ink in a murky sea. A cold rotten watercolour in his head. Everything around her wanted to grip and taint her; twining black tendrils to pull her down in the greenbrown mire. She strained to keep her own mind in here; thoughts of life and light. Her hope sparked suddenly in his head; burning like fire in a poisoned night all around her. Wandering on deeper into the rancid dark.

‘Seven?’ she said, searching the watersmoke forest for his bright white thoughts. Until she remembered... he wasn’t anywhere. This was him. This was his mind, his hard drive; maybe even his soul. She was deep in the heart of it. What the hell was going on? How was she even in here? All she knew was that her friend was dying alone in some poisoned coma, buried away in these rot-stench nightmare thoughts; bleeding all his huge life and strength away.

‘Come back,’ she told him quietly, reaching out her hands. Touching the inkplume trees that shivered and shredded like mist. Her touch turned dank decay into flaming flying sparks, sky-scorching white. She dived right to his centre, and held the dull pulsing colour she found there close to her heart. Watched a light pulse and burst from her in a glowing molten thunderstorm, firework-screeching, raining sparks from an endless sky. Felt everything she felt for him; loyal and precious and fierce. Held that dying colour to herself until it crackled inside her. She clutched and warmed and sparked that thinking core of him until it blew nuclear, and scorched the inkfall darkness away. Suddenly she was on the ground, back in the real. Back in the world.

What the hell just happened? Tabitha asked herself. Seven was blinking, startled. Twitching and straining against the roots that pinned him down. Wrestling his giant strength against the dead web around him. Clutching the thickest branch, Tabitha shot volts into it. Watched it spark and crackle and burn apart, and hacked away at more roots along his sides. Seven was struggling against them; snapping them with fibrous gunshot cracks. Straining and growling in all his massive angry strength; forcing himself free. Suddenly his wing was out, clawing the branches in a blind rage. Tore his neck free of the roots and bit down into them, tearing them away. With all the deafening splintered chaos of a forest falling down, he ripped himself from the roots and turned frantically in the clearing. Had to get away from here. Had to get away.

‘Wait!’ Tabitha screamed, trying to run out in front of him as he snarled and staggered in tortured panic. ‘It’s ok! Seven!’ but her ship crashed past and launched himself blindly off the mountain into the moonlit night, and faltered. His strangled jetscales spluttered and choked, and he was falling. Flapping frantically; dropping like a statue. Seven hit the slopes below in a jerking, thundering dirtcloud thump that echoed over the lake.

Climbing down the mountain with Fishbowl as quickly as she dared, Tabitha followed a vast fresh scar through the landscape; a gigantic furrow ploughed up where Seven had crashed down. Through fallen pines the great black heap of his body lay still, but for his muted breaths.

‘Seven?’ Tabitha said softly, her eyes wide with concern as she came closer. ‘Are you alright?’ She ran her hand along his scarred scales as she edged cautiously towards his big head. What used to feel like a blazing reactor under his skin was nothing more than a weak sorry pulse. His hard white eyes were open; staring at nothing. He didn’t even acknowledge her.

‘Seven,’ she said, trying to coax him around. He wasn’t responding. She couldn’t get a feel for his thoughts when she touched his snout; he was just lying there in the fresh crater. Staring ahead; absolutely beaten. Lost to the world. Setting down Fishbowl’s limp body close by, Tabitha sat by Seven’s head and hugged his snout. Didn’t say a word; didn’t think. Just sat there with him, wiping her tears, her cheek pressed against his cold scales. Slowly his feelings began to show themselves; colours in her head. A vile purple brown, sick as poison, creeping like mould.

‘Don’t give up,’ she urged him quietly, her voice faltering, as she pushed her voltage into his scales. Brushing away her tears. ‘You’re strong, Seven. You’re stronger than that thing. Don’t let it beat you now.’ No response. He just lay there breathing, fast and shallow, lost in dark despondence. Like he’d been poisoned braindead; starved of sunlight and rotted past hope. She touched his snout and took another sad look in his thoughts; a black gaping pit. Gulping past the lump in her throat, sniffling her tears, Tabitha pulled Fishbowl close and picked the last clinging shoots away. Carefully lay its limp rubber-squeaking body down in her lap. A hand on each of her monsters, pulsing her current into them.

‘I’m not giving up on you,’ she whispered to them, watching the moon rise over the trees. ‘I never will.’

When Tabitha woke in the moonlit dark, Fishbowl was moving. It flopped down in the dirt, dragging itself away like a popped balloon. Tabitha felt her heart ache at the sight of it; it looked so frail. When she got up to help it, it struggled against her weakly. Just trying to get away to safety.

‘Hey, it’s me,’ Tabitha told it quietly. ‘I’m going to look after you.’ Taking up a tentacle in her hand, Tabitha pushed her current into it. Fishbowl gave up its struggle and just lay there in her lap, drinking her current weakly.

Covered in dirt and dried rotten slime, lying limp in the moonlight in Tabitha’s lap, a tiny light flickered and glowed in Fishbowl. Slowly, Tabitha felt the current kindle inside it. Felt it coming around. Heard its gills puff choked crackling breaths and clear themselves of whatever poisoned filth that tree had filled them with.

‘It’s ok,’ Tabitha said softly, as the creature began to twitch and move. ‘Just don’t try to go anywhere for a while. I’ve got you.’ She felt one of its arms wrap itself around her wrist. Holding her tight as it lay slumped in her lap. Fishbowl pulled itself closer then; holding on to her like a frightened child.

‘Come on,’ she whispered gently, picking up its limp body to sit back down beside Seven. As she lay her head down against his, a stick snapped in the trees and she sat bolt upright. She held Fishbowl tighter to herself against the icy wind, and flicked out her sparking claws ready to protect her monsters. Staring into the moonlit dark for any sign of what was watching them.

‘Don’t even try it,’ Tabitha growled at the vast night all around them, ignoring her growing shivers in the silent cold. ‘I’ll fucking execute you. I swear to god.’

It was one of the longest nights Tabitha could ever remember. So many times she turned to hear Seven coughing and choking, a gale of breath against her, gulping massive gasps of air into clogged lungs. She’d stroke his snout as he settled down, feeding him voltage from her palms until she was about to black out; only for him to wake a moment later in another bout of crackling chokes. Time and again, whatever the hell was out there in the blackness would take a creeping footstep between the trees nearby. She’d catch the glint of an eye here and there in the moonlight; a soft rustle off to one side. She spread her palm towards the sound and let the last of her voltage worm and crackle between her fingers, just to let them know what was waiting for them if they tried anything. To let them know, whatever was out there, that these things with her weren’t prey. They belonged to her, and she belonged to them. They were protected.

Tabitha was straining to keep her eyes open by dawn. A dim orange light crept through the sky, turning the deep dark blue to a seeping tapestry of glassy grey. The last alien stars disappeared in the light of the rising sun. Fishbowl began to move in her arm; it dragged itself away and tried to float.

‘Here, you,’ Tabitha said softly, taking her water skin to trickle its contents into Fishbowl’s searching tentacle. Gulping it down, Fishbowl staggered and flopped in the dirt. Dragged itself up. Walked; stumbled; fell down. Tabitha sprang up to help it, but its arms pushed her hands gently away. She watched its clear crumpled fishbowl head start to inflate. It took on that faint old ghostly glow, deep inside. The creature was slower, dirtier and looking decidedly sickly, but still managed a low trembling hover before it had to rest.

‘Look at you,’ said Tabitha, smiling proudly. Hugging herself against the biting cold.

Tabitha returned from the forested slopes with the driest firewood she could find, and set it down to circle some rocks and spark a fresh campfire. The wind was stronger up here on this narrow clearing; colder too. She’d need a shelter here for a while, she supposed, until Seven and Fishbowl regained some strength.

‘You could’ve picked a better spot to crash land,’ she joked, stroking Seven’s snout. He didn’t acknowledge her; didn’t even open his eyes. ‘Hey, anyone in?’ she asked him, patting his stony scales. ‘Seven?’ Nothing. ‘Seven!’ He wasn’t breathing. ‘Shit!’ she snapped, panicking. ‘Don’t you dare do this to me, you bastard!’ She was slapping her palms on his solid scales, feeling frantically for a pulse of current. Nothing. ‘Fishbowl, come here, quick!’ she said. The creature wasn’t listening; or if it was then it didn’t follow orders. Tabitha shot volts into Seven’s snout from her palms; still no response. Cursing, she ran over to Fishbowl and grabbed it up, setting it down hurriedly beside Seven’s head.

‘You have to help him, ok?’ she said desperately, taking one of Fishbowl’s arms and putting it against his snout. ‘You have to give him some current. As much as you can.’ Sure enough, Fishbowl tapped at his snout and shot every crackling volt. Tabitha waited, barely breathing. Nothing.

‘Again,’ she told Fishbowl, terrified. But the current just wasn’t enough. Seven lay there like a corpse. ‘Shit!’ Tabitha snapped, running around his side to see if there was anything different. Searching his jetscale vents in vain for any kind of cause. When she walked back along his other side though, she noticed the tendrils. Hanging from his back teeth like spindly roots. Pushing against the sheer weight of his head, Tabitha crushed her doubt and climbed into Seven’s mouth. Feeling around desperately for anything that wasn’t Seven. Cramped and crouching, she tried to reach into his black throat. There was something in there; something big. A massive tangled knot that seemed bigger than she was, rustling in the dark where she grabbed it. Tabitha strained to grip it, but the brittle vines kept snapping away. Tried to reach in as far as she could, tried to claw at it... but it was useless. She didn’t have any choice; she had to let go of his giant jaw above her. His mouth dropped shut on her, forcing her to all fours as the roof pressed down. She crawled deeper into the top of his throat; a giant bony press all around her. Feeling around in the darkness, trying to light her way with crackling volts, she caught a good thick rustling chunk of the tangle back there. Tugged at it with all her strength, and just hoped she wasn’t stuck in Seven’s mouth for good.

Straining and reaching, try after try in the pitch-black squeeze, Tabitha felt the panic setting in. Shoved herself further into Seven’s throat until she’d grabbed two solid handfuls and tugged the tangle free. She pulled at the matter like a thick dead bush, dragging its rustling weight back up his throat. They snagged on something. The thick tendrils were buried in the walls of his throat; tangled around his spine. Around his skull. They were budging though. With enough force, the vines came trembling and sliding back out. There was so much of it in there, in his skull; Tabitha felt sick. She backed up into his mouth again, pulling at vines that just kept coming like ropes. A twitch. There was a twitch in his throat then; she felt it. And a choke. Metal breath rushed against her face; a smell like hot engines.

‘That’s it Seven!’ she shouted to him, her voice muffled in his mouth. Tangled up in a ball of dead vines and gory tendrils she’d pulled free. ‘Now spit it all out! Come on!’ As she grinned victoriously though, her face suddenly dropped. Way down deep in that tunnel of a throat she saw a faint white glow, getting brighter. Fire.

‘Open your mouth!’ she yelled at him, pushing against the roof of his jaw. His teeth were creaking apart, but that was as far as she could push in the cramped space. Trapped in all the slimy tangle of vines. The smooth bony plates inside his mouth weren’t nearly as grippy as his rough scales outside. Her pushing hands kept slipping on them; sliding around. ‘Seven, open your mouth!’ she yelled desperately, watching in horror as the ghostly white glow grew hot and blinding in his throat. ‘Seven!’ His mouth flew open then in a giant choking cough, sending Tabitha and the knotted roots flying out to crash-land in the dirt. Picking herself up, grubby and grinning, Tabitha stared in awe at the most monumental coughing fit she’d ever seen in her life. Seven was roaring, staggering up; belching pillars of white fire fifty feet in the air. Taking fresh colossal breaths as he blinked his white eyes open. He was looking around, newly alert, hauling himself to his feet.

‘Welcome back,’ said Tabitha, grinning. She felt her heart racing to see Seven yawn and shudder and shake it all off like a giant black dog. Immediately Fishbowl floated past her and up onto Seven’s back, sinking into the cockpit hatch and closing the scales behind it. Settling down behind the pilot seat for the charging of a lifetime.

Seven slept all day and well into the next, basking in the bright winter sunlight, with Tabitha curled and snoring warmly in his cave of a wing. She spent her waking hours scrubbing his scales clean with her palms, and burning off the stubborn roots like ivy marks with her current. She fed the crackling campfire and walked slow laps around him, pulling any last vines away from his giant sides. His warm metal smell was slowly growing stronger; some of the smallest pocks and scars in his scales had begun to heal.

Tabitha watched the clear blue sky slowly murk and darken to heavy clouds, and ducked back down into Seven’s sheltering wing to snatch a little more rest herself. Curled and dozing against his huge warmth, like central heating. She watched the tumbling snowstorm from her living black shelter; the snow melted and steamed off Seven’s hot scales. He was resting so deeply that she couldn’t find his thoughts. Nothing from him but steady sleeping breaths, huge and prehistoric. He felt like a gigantic oven beside her. She studied the grain of a giant black scale, rough and intricate; stroking it with her thumb in a whispering metal grind. Breathing his stone-metal smell as she curled up and slept.

Tabitha woke with a deep in-breath a while later, well rested, and smiled to see Seven blink open his big eyes.

‘Are you alright?’ she asked him gently, wiping dirt off his black scales. Walking around to pat his snout and feel his thoughts. Seven played it casual, and tried to pride his way through the whole thing like it was no big deal.

‘Oh, ok,’ Tabitha chuckled. ‘Well come on then, if you’re feeling so strong all of a sudden,’ she told him happily, brushing the gore and grime off her catsuit. ‘Let’s go for a ride.’ She climbed up his offered wing to jump in the saddle scale, and suddenly felt like herself again. Smiling, she watched the cold shining sun over the far frozen peaks. Their two minds clicked like a plug in a socket; a raw sudden rising inside her.

‘It’s good to have you back. You stubborn bastard,’ she told him warmly, her grubby face lit with a grin. She felt his giant current like a reactor beneath her. His stone-solid scales and hot-metal smell. She kicked a heel in Seven’s side as the harness grew around her, and launched him off the precipice in a wind-deafening dive. A rollercoaster dip in her stomach; the happy terror of falling. His jetscales sparked and rumbled into thrashing new life beneath her, rising in a drone to bursting white flame. Seven swept low over slopes and rushing treetops, and shot for the sky in a thundering jetroar boom.

26

Squidlizards saw some strange black shape diving from the sky and ran terrified across the lakeshore. Yelped and whimpered from giant snapping claws as they scrambled into the trees. Tabitha swept Seven down to skim the lake in a storm of spray, laughing like a maniac. Spat his fire into the water in screaming boiling bangs to scare that weird monster in the deep. She shot for the sky with a thought and a grin; Seven’s wings twirling in a corkscrew spin. They soared between mountain peaks and drenched themselves through a freezing waterfall; Seven burst from the tumbling mist like a bullet. Alien birds scattered, shrieking in fear. Tabitha felt that same old adrenalin rush inside her when she spun him and dropped, and felt the fireworks burst in Seven’s head. Pure joy. Freedom distilled. The deer ran terrified below as Seven skimmed the bamboo trees. Tabitha gave him free reign and had to pull her mask up, he was flying so fast. Hurtling for the heavens like a monstrous black rocket. Frost crept across her catsuit like pale crystal mould. Looking down, diving back, the jagged mountains were hazy anthills. The lake, a shining puddle. This vast savage world felt so much smaller now, as Seven dived down to race past the trees and hills. Squidlizards and dark creeping pantherwolves; she could crush them under her heel. She could drop from the sky with a fierce snarling thought, and destroy anything that wanted her dead. ...Or was that Seven’s thought? A sudden massive roar came rumbling out of him like a landslide. Echoing jurassic through the winter world, like he owned the lot.

‘What the hell was that!?’ Stone Shore bellowed, running from the caves to stare into the sky. He felt his stomach twist when some giant new terror swept overhead, with a roar like rumbling thunder.

‘What was it?’ Raging Flame called behind him, running from the entrance to try to glimpse it. It’d vanished beyond the crags.

‘A creature of hell!’ Stone Shore yelled furiously, pointing to the sky as the villagers came running from the caves. ‘The demons bring their beasts to war!’ Looks of panic spread across the tribe’s faces; a sudden racket of worried questions.

‘No. That’s not their way,’ Deep Roots replied, walking along behind them. ‘The sky demons come with boats, not living beasts. That sound was an animal call.’

‘What are you talking about, you old fool!?’ Stone Shore spat back. ‘I saw a demon!’

‘A bird-spirit,’ Deep Roots corrected him, looking around as the tribe fell silent. ‘It’s her.’

Sweeping high over the lake, Seven roared at the world in a rushing burst of white fire.

‘Hey. Let’s go,’ Tabitha told him happily, gripping the saddle scale. ‘Let’s find another world.’ Seven’s thoughts replied that they couldn’t. Not yet.

‘Why not?’ she demanded, impatient to leave this cold ancient place behind. When she lowered the saddle scale into his cockpit, it was carnage. Dead tangled roots clung everywhere; they’d eaten away half his skin in here. Fishbowl floated dormant by the scarred flight console.

‘Oh god Seven,’ she said, her heart aching, as she put a hand on the raw bleeding skin of the cockpit walls. ‘What did that thing do to you?’ Seven replied in her head that he didn’t have the strength to leave the atmosphere. Not yet. There was some kind of fleshy tissue he needed to breed oxygen on space flights, running right through his skin. The roots had eaten it away.

‘Like algae, or something?’ Tabitha wondered, studying the mauled skin on the ceiling. Gently pulling the dead roots away. ‘...Are you ok?’ she said anxiously. He’d live, he replied in her head. He’d heal. He just needed to rest.

‘Of course,’ said Tabitha, in sudden concern. Felt her grief and guilt rising up. ‘Seven, I’m so sorry. I didn’t protect you,’ she told him sadly, her voice faltering. ‘I didn’t reach you soon enough. But I’ll make it up to you, I promise. I’m going to look after you.’

Setting Seven down on the mountain clearing where she’d made her vine hut, Tabitha sat and stared at the world. She wondered what she could do with her time, while he was healing. The world was laid out far below her, with no shortage of things going on. New species, tribal peoples, some strange advanced race that struck terror into their hearts...

No. I’m not getting involved, she told herself. I’ll mess things up even more. If she was going to stay well away from everything going on here, then there wasn’t really much to do. Not unless she busied herself with something different, her own little project, to pass the time.

Well, I’ve kind of started that already, she thought. Her shelter here and its warm campfire, by the deep fresh pool and the peaceful pines... and now her monsters were here with her too... it’d saved her sanity. She couldn’t control that vast cold world out there, beyond the mountaintop. It was savage; impossibly huge. But this little patch right here, this was hers. This, she could control. Create a home for them while Seven and Fishbowl recovered, and clear it all away when they were ready to leave. Like they’d never been here.

‘Me and Fishbowl could make a garden,’ she told Seven, patting his huge scales where he lay. ‘You just rest and get lots of sunlight, ok? I’ll make us a home.’ Seven replied in her head. ‘Well, I know you don’t care about that. But I do,’ she told him. ‘So shush your face and get some rest.’

Tabitha walked over to her tiny hut and set about pushing the wild world back, one pulled weed at a time. Setting down rock borders around her cleared patch of ground, she turned up the rich soft soil to make a garden. Replanted the strange vampire flowers she’d left by the pines and fed them her blood. They looked different though, as they grew; they were sturdier. Spectral. Their limbs, glassy and translucent... more like the mollusc tree she’d killed up on the peak. As if the tree’s leeching roots, or its sap’s bitter taste, had given her something more. As they took in the sunlight, the flowers began to glow clearer, like underwater creatures. Bioluminescent. They were haunting to look at; winter-cold and shining. A twisted ghostly garden outside her hut.

Once she’d taught Fishbowl not to pull up her creations, it puttered around ceaselessly to tend the new garden. She’d thought about allowing it a few seeds from Seven’s cockpit, for a taste of home; but that wouldn’t be right. Those were alien species that didn’t belong here. And besides, those plants were engineered to take over worlds. It’d be insane to introduce them here.

I’ve already mutated the plant life here, Tabitha told herself, looking at the pale glowing flowers in her garden. Should I pull it all up? Destroy it?

She watched frogsquirrels hopping and scurrying up the trees in winding spirals; their leathery tails trailed like bright streamers behind them. She could get used to life here for a little while, she supposed. A lonely existence... but a peaceful one. Waiting for Seven to get his strength back, so they could leave this world behind. Carry on searching for her tribe in the stars, she supposed. There had to be more worlds out there; there had to be other cultures more advanced than this. Like the demons that the tribe talked about; the ship she’d seen fly overhead.

Who are they? She wondered. Where are they from? ...Here?

Tabitha spent the rest of the daylight extending her garden, building a second square border of stones. She set down one chunky rock beside another with a satisfying clunk. Tightly packed in tiny walls to hold the turned soil, just like her dad used to do. She replanted the hardy mountain flowers growing around here into neat rows and coloured patterns. Any little thing to bring order to this wild world.

‘Can you water those, please?’ she asked Fishbowl, standing up to stretch her stiff back. She looked out at the lake and the forest, sprawling out below into the distance. It wasn’t so high up here that she had to face the fierce cold and winds of the summit; but still high enough to keep clear of the tribe and the demons they were facing. Not her problems, though; she couldn’t interfere.

But... the safe silence up here, and the rare luxury of peace, they got her thinking. Maybe it wasn’t going to be that simple to leave, once Seven healed. Like there was something holding her back. Snagged on a thought, bugging her like a splinter. One little what if.

Sitting in Seven’s scarred cockpit, she told him everything. Like he was her therapist or something. She told him how she’d survived the wild and tried to climb the mountain to find him and Fishbowl. How she’d met the tribe, the cave clan, and they’d taken her in. How she’d lived with them and earned her name and how suddenly, one day, there were spaceships flying overhead. She’d saved someone’s life and beaten the tribe’s alpha, and suddenly they’d treated her like a leader. She had to get away. She’d already interfered too much.

Seven was silent for a while; Tabitha sat waiting for his response. It was a simple reply in her head.

‘I can’t. I’m not a ruler,’ she told him, hugging her knees to her chest. Tugged out her grey-blue parka from under the seat and wore it like a blanket. ‘I’m an alien species. I’ll ruin their whole evolution. No, we have to leave.’ She looked out of his vision at the mountains around them, and the night’s soft frozen veil. Seven reminded her that he couldn’t leave any time soon. He was hurting, after their quick flight today; far from strong enough to jump off-world. Until that thick web of tissue grew back beneath his scales, he’d suffocate in space. Told her that she had no choice but to stay, at least for now... and asked if it wasn’t down to her to protect that tribe.

‘That’s Stone Shore’s job. I’m not their alpha,’ Tabitha replied. ‘I’m not even their species. I never asked for this.’ Seven replied that if she didn’t go back and lead this tribe, then they could change, or suffer, far more under these new visitors than under her. She had the power to defend their way of life, during what sounded like an invasion. It was her duty to protect them.

‘Duty!?’ she snapped. ‘I’ve got nothing to do with them, or their world!’ she argued. That wasn’t true, Seven told her. From the sounds of it, they’d taken her in like one of their own. Protected her from this world when she’d been stranded, with nowhere to go. They’d given her a tribe to belong to; was that not what she’d been looking for? Was that not why they’d crossed the stars for so long? ...What more did she want?

‘Hm,’ Tabitha replied quietly, mulling it over. She sat silently for a while, lost in thought. ‘Well, it’s true. I’m looking for a tribe to belong to,’ she admitted, leaning back in the seat. Her therapy chair. ‘But I wasn’t thinking of a tribe quite so... tribal,’ she said, uncertainly. I’m such a snob. Seven replied that it was her choice, if she wanted to carry on searching the stars for her new home. A more advanced people, like her own. Whatever she wanted to do, he’d help her. She was his tribe.

‘I know,’ Tabitha replied, smiling. She reached out from the seat to stroke his raw flayed walls. Watched the plastic solar flower swaying side to side on the flight console. She could feel Seven thinking. How did they know if they’d ever find another tribe out there, he asked her. Would they ever find one that she could make such a difference to?

‘Hmm,’ she said despondently, climbing out of the hatch. ‘Thanks Seven. I need to think for a while.’

Tabitha walked back across the clearing, stopping to look up at countless stars. Leave the tribe alone, and risk losing their way of life to this advanced race, she told herself. Help them repel that race, and risk losing their way of life to me.

Tabitha woke up stiff and bleary-eyed in her hut the next day.

‘Morning,’ she croaked drowsily to her monsters outside, trying to forget about Earth and her guiltridden nightmares. Fishbowl was hovering busily between the plants; Seven was perched and staring on the outcrop.

‘Whatcha looking at?’ Tabitha asked him, running her hand through Fishbowl’s greeting arms and wandering up beside Seven on the precipice. She clutched the black pantherwolf fur tighter around her; her teeth chattering as she tried to work out what Seven was watching.

‘Come on, what’re you looking at?’ she said eventually, touching a hand to Seven’s scales. His thought popped into her head. ‘What!? Where!?’ she said in shock, watching the world below with fresh intensity. An explosion. Churning smoke, miles away. ‘There, I can see it!’ she told him, throwing off the pantherwolf fur to scramble up his wing. ‘Go!’ she yelled, as the harness grew around her. Seven leapt off the mountain, jetscales flaring, and tore off for the towering dustcloud on the horizon.

Futuristic troops watched the giant animal carefully from around their dropship, as its pale red-haired rider landed down in the distant tree line. A few hundred yards away, Tabitha studied them in return. Tried to make out what the churning dustcloud was behind them, but didn’t want to get too close.

‘I don’t think they come in peace,’ Tabitha told Seven in the saddle. Watching the distant men and women, their body language made it clear that they were the ones with the guns. Hands to earpieces, they kept looking over at her, describing the alien on its big black monster.

‘No, we’re just going to watch,’ Tabitha replied to Seven’s thought in her head. I’m not going to start a war. There was a big crawling shape in all the smoke and dust behind the troops; something eating the rocky ground itself. Was it... mining? The soldiers wore full-face masks; no eyes or mouths were visible. Faceless men and women in faceless helmets, organising in rapid manoeuvres to cover every angle around their ship. Rifles lowered but ready as they watched her in the distance. No two soldiers were dressed the same though, that was the thing; they looked more like mercenaries. No shared markings or insignia on their armour; just rough multicoloured paint jobs. The dropship’s engines roared into life behind them, and punched the ground in a sudden grass-churning rush; the troops were yelling in confusion as the thing lifted off and thundered into the sky. Rumbling away for the stars, leaving the strange panicked soldiers and their rock-eating machine on the plains.

‘Where!?’ Tabitha said suddenly, as Seven spotted some of the natives. They were running from the forest far to their right, yelling with raised spears as they closed in on the soldiers across the plain. The troops had their hands outstretched; warning or urging peace. Shouting over loudspeakers in some bizarre alien language, they sent a pair of representatives forward quickly to negotiate. An arrow whistled out and dropped one of them to the ground; another killed the second as they dragged the casualty back. The troops quickly closed ranks. Aimed their rifles on the charging tribals and yelled in warning. When a flying spear dropped another one dead, the troops opened fire in self defence before the natives got in close. Tabitha stared in shock at a sudden laserfire massacre.

‘Go! Go!’ she yelled at Seven, urging him towards the fighting across the plain. But it wasn’t the Cave Clan. The natives fighting on the tundra weren’t the brown-furred tribe she knew. Their fur shone silky bronze in the sunlight. Wrestling with invaders from another world; shot down as they charged them. That whirring brute of a machine still ate the ground too; she glimpsed it sifting bright gold from the dirt. Diving Seven over the scene she saw dead tribals, gunned down for defending their world. And killers, robbing a planet that didn’t stand a chance.

It’s like the Watchers all over again. That one thought was all it took. Tabitha gripped Seven’s saddle tight, the fury rising inside her. Seven wheeled in the grey sky and dived snarling on the invaders. Hurling white fire that scattered the troops and lit the dank world like nothing it’d ever seen. The mercenaries that stood and fired on him, he reduced to blowing ash. The fleeing tribe watched in awe as the beast swept overhead in a flaming smokecloud; some strange war god come down from the sky to spit sunfire and send the demons running. The troops’ lasershots did nothing but smoke against Seven’s scales. When he turned and dropped like a hawk and tore the hulking mining machine to scrap, the panicked invaders scattered across the plain.

‘...Enough,’ Tabitha told him, steadying herself in the saddle as Seven climbed off the machine’s flaming wreck. He growled and watched them running with cold white eyes; snapped his jaws and turned towards the hills and the watching tribe. Tabitha heard a rising call on the cold wind; the bronze-backed natives were yelling and howling on the distant slope. But something else caught Tabitha’s attention, in the grass and heath at Seven’s feet. Dark shapes, dropped in the long grass during the invaders’ panicked escape. Rifles.

The bronze-furred tribe watched her from a cautious distance. The red-haired witch and her giant lizardbird, stark and black on the tundra.

‘I won’t hurt you,’ Tabitha called to them, leaving Seven behind to walk closer. Waited in the windblown silence for a reply. They just stood and stared, leaning on their spears in the distance to watch her carefully. They couldn’t understand her words; she was too far away to sign to them like she had with Deep Roots. They had every right to be wary of her; just another demon invading their world. Tabitha thought over what she was about to do. Whether it was right, or whether she was about to mess with their evolution on a monumental scale. The thing was though... their worst nightmare had already come to this world. One that outgunned the poor bastards pitifully, and thought they had some right to plunder this planet and rob these people of their resources. She couldn’t just leave them to fend off the next visit with spears. They had to fight for their world now. She walked over to the nearest chunky shape in the damp blowing grass. Picked up the rifle and raised it for them to see.

‘Take these!’ she called to the tribe, across the cold windy moor. No response. They were just watching. ‘Take them to protect yourselves! From the invaders!’ she added, pointing in the direction that the troops had fled. Nothing though; they were still just staring in the windblown silence. Holding on to one another and their sobbing cubs, lost and shocked or weeping over their dead. Should she fire a shot away into the tundra, and show them what to do with them? Or would that give them the wrong idea entirely, that she was here to threaten them too? When she walked closer, they backed off. Instead she made a ceremony of offering the rifle to them, just so it was clear, and laid it down in the grass. Pointed to the tribe, and the gun, and opened out her hands. Walking away silently to climb Seven’s wing and take the saddle, Tabitha launched him into the sky. Took one last look at the staring tribe down below, and just hoped they’d be alright.

Soaring over the plains, Tabitha was determined to find out where the troops had come from. There was no sign of them; had they been extracted already? Seven flew for miles out beyond the tundra, though there was nothing but sad endless marsh. Tough grass and the odd twisted tree, in a shining puddled sea of black peat. So many miles of featureless nothing, stretching out to a range of rainy mountains on the horizon. Looking closer though, there were figures down there. More people like Deep Roots’ Cave Clan, but darker; less furred. Mobbing some screeching amphibian beast to eat it alive. Looking up at her and Seven in fascination.

‘Let’s turn back,’ Tabitha told him, nudging him around. There was something pulling her back. A worry. If the invaders were trying to mine this world then they wouldn’t start out here in endless peat bog. They wouldn’t be put off by a single fight, and clearly wouldn’t let the natives stop them. It seemed vain when she thought about it, that she was the only one who could tip the balance for these tribes. But... wasn’t it true? The natives could take care of themselves, against the challenges their own world threw at them. But not these invaders. They had guns. Like, lasers. Dropships and mining machines. There’d be more of them, and the tribes didn’t stand a chance. If she left now, she’d think back to this world for the rest of her life. How she’d had the power to help a tribe, an entire people... and did nothing.

Like Earth all over again.

Tabitha was deep in thought as they flew back for Sacred Mountain in the distance. She couldn’t just leave this world to be plundered. She couldn’t leave its people to be robbed of their future, like she’d left her own. She could change things here; she had to. Before it was too late.

‘Go, Seven,’ she told him, urging him to full speed. They shot away for the forested hills. She had to know that Deep Roots and the Cave Clan were ok. She had to find them. Had to warn them.

27

As Seven slowed and banked around the far side of familiar hills, Tabitha saw smoke. It was pouring up from the entrance to home-cave. She felt her stomach twist in dread. The invaders had been here. Maybe scouting the place. They’d probably been attacked by Cave Clan, and retaliated.

When she landed in the forest to look inside, the cave village was smoking rubble. An orange wall of heat inside that she couldn’t even stand from the entrance.

At least there’s no bodies. Tabitha sighed suddenly, as the knot of tension unwound in her chest. They’d made it out alive. When she emerged blinking and coughing into the daylit forest, she couldn’t see any sign of the tribe. No sign of who’d torched the place either.

‘Hello?’ she called to the forest around her, climbing onto Seven’s back. ‘Deep Roots? Sea Mist? Hello!’ no reply. ‘...I can help you!’ she yelled, waiting for any response. Any sign of them hiding. Nothing. If anything’s happened to them...

‘I’m up on Sacred Mountain!’ she called out, in case they were watching. ‘I’ll be back!’ wringing her hands together anxiously with rasping whispers, Tabitha let the harness grow around her in the saddle and urged Seven up into the sky.

She searched the forest and the lakeshore desperately for the rest of the day, until she couldn’t see a thing in the growing night. She climbed into the cockpit to see the world through Seven’s ghostly night vision, and flew again over every square mile she knew. Hours later there was still no sign of them.

‘Shit,’ she mumbled, steering Seven away back to the mountain. Landing by her hut she stoked the fire as big as she could get it, hoping to make a beacon for the tribe to see down there in the forest.

‘Where are they?’ she asked Fishbowl anxiously, feeding another branch to the fire, as the creature hovered over to rest beside her. All she could do now was keep stoking up the flames as a signal; she tried waving an eerie glowing moonflower in the night.

Later Tabitha just sat staring by the fire, as the worries ate away at her in the dark gusty silence. Fishbowl was cold comfort; it was too busy tending its promising new garden.

‘Seven, can you do your thing?’ she asked him. ‘Give them a signal?’ Seven raised his head and roared in the night, echoing across the lake and the forest below. Followed it with a giant pillar of rushing white flame.

‘I hope they’re ok,’ she told him, as he sat like a towering statue beside her. ‘We’ll look again tomorrow.’ She knew he was listening, but said it more for her own sake. The guilt and worry gnawed at her. Gave her a sick anxious feeling, that she’d let them down. It was the same old story: she’d had a duty, and she’d ran away. They weren’t just some bunch of savages that she’d suddenly had to lead; how could she even think like that? They were decent people, with kids and livelihoods, and hopes and fears. Probably wandering the wilds tonight, lost and hopeless. Out there with the pantherwolves and the squidlizards, desperate to keep their children safe. They were people she’d lived with, and come to know. She couldn’t bear the thought of them being in danger; it made her sick to her stomach. No way she was sleeping tonight.

‘Come on,’ she told Seven, pushing herself up from the freezing ground. Climbing into the saddle. ‘Let’s keep looking.’

Exhausted, Tabitha set Seven down in the snow-covered forest the next morning. Still no sign of them; Cave Clan were good at disappearing. Unless...

Did the invaders take them? For so many people to just vanish like this, it was definitely a possibility. The snowy forest was eerily silent around her; a living painting in black and white. An ice puddle split beneath her dark feet with a squeaking toffee crack. Brilliant snow clumped thick in the bushes and coated the ground like a sea of cotton wool. Three-toed deer tracks were everywhere, leading off into the trees. There were bigger footprints too, like a pantherwolf... and a drop of blood.

Following the thickening trail of dots and drips, Tabitha came across a dead soldier through the trees. A bright scarlet mess on the pure white snow. Custom armour torn apart; clearly mercenary. Staring in shock, Tabitha breathed vapour clouds in the silence. The bright-skinned woman had been mangled to gore. Her gun, chewed to useless scrap. Looking away grimly as she searched the soldier’s body, Tabitha came across a touchscreen sleeve on the woman’s wrist. Pulling it on, and tapping uncertainly at the single button, the screen blinked to life with a bizarre cloud of floating icons. Most of them meant nothing; a few stood out though. One of the icons could only mean screen brightness, while another had to be volume control. Even just to have working tech in her hands after so long felt alien; she was fixated with it. Swiping a hard finger across the screen, Tabitha cycled the icons until one caught her eye. A symbol for some kind of network connection.

‘You guys have space internet?’ she asked the soldier’s body, crouching to take a stubby earpiece from the woman’s head. Walking away to study the gadget, and wiping the blood off it, she put the earpiece in. Wished that she felt more than numb indifference to the bloody corpse behind her... but she’d become kind of practised at blocking out the horror. If I don’t think about it, it isn’t there. When she climbed Seven’s shoulder and took off over the forest, the body wasn’t there. Just another horror locked away, in a numb old side of her, hidden in the back of her mind.

Seven landed in the mountain clearing, and watched Tabitha curiously as she walked off to study the sleeve on her wrist. Tapping the connection icon, the screen greeted her with a calm blue glow and a loading motif. Then a search tool. Tapping it again, she was faced with an alien keyboard of otherworldly symbols.

‘Er,’ Tabitha mumbled, pressing at random characters. Brought up mysterious menus and commands. ‘Huh,’ she said to herself, mystified, tapping away as she wandered back to her shelter. A few random options, then up popped a map of the mountain and the lake.

‘Where’s this network coming from?’ she muttered, studying the screen as she fed a fresh campfire. ‘Can’t be this world,’ she mumbled, as a series of videos popped up on the screen. Hovering by, Fishbowl tapped a tentacle to the device and recharged it with a jolt of current.

‘Oh, thank you,’ she said happily, as the creature floated off to its garden. Whatever language the small alien spoke in the video she was watching, it sounded very similar to the rest. Every video had new presenters of different races, but they all spoke this one language. So the invaders spoke it too... and knowing it herself could only help in dealing with them. She had to learn all she could about who she was up against, and where they came from. Curling up into the warm black pantherwolf fur in her nest, Tabitha kept tapping to learn whatever the glowing screen could teach her.

The more videos she watched, the more certain words stood out to her. Only the small words, like a and the. But it was a start, and learning was all just repetition. Speaking the invaders’ language would be a new tool, a weapon, to give her an edge over them. ...Plus, it’d keep her busy while Seven and Fishbowl lay around resting and healing, and doing very little else.

Dusk descended; the winter world was darkening to black. Tabitha dug up one of her weird moonflowers to feed it current, and planted it inside her hut like a living lantern. Took hold of the stem to grow and shape it into an otherworldly lamp. A pale aquatic light to work by, as she curled into the furs and studied the alien videos, repeating the smaller words. It was best to stay busy, she knew, as she sniffled and wiped her tears. It stopped her missing home.

Tabitha woke cold the next morning, sipped hot water by the fire, and set to work on a moonflower creation. A tall straight stem, its branches sculpted to shoot off at even intervals. Every branch ended with a flower in a soft pulsing light. A bright knobbly vine wound its way up the plant in an untidy spiral, from its wide bottom branches to the glowing tip.

‘Well, it sort of looks like a Christmas tree,’ Tabitha mumbled to herself, hand on chin as she studied her work. Pacing around to see every angle. ‘...It’s shit,’ she fretted. It was only something to mark the days passing; an anchor point for her sanity. Christmas Day on this cold ancient Stormworld. The start of the Tabithian calendar.

‘Merry Christmas,’ she told Fishbowl happily, as it floated over to raise a curious tentacle to the new tree. The creature didn’t flinch quite so much any more when she hugged it; maybe it was getting used to her.

‘Merry Christmas Seven,’ she said brightly, patting his wing. He blinked open a big eye and studied her, then snorted a sigh and went back to sleep. ‘I love Christmas,’ Tabitha told no one in particular, smiling as she walked back to her crappy tree. Well, it wasn’t that bad, she supposed. The branches were all crooked and glowing, but it still had the basic shape. Kind of. She was making the effort, anyway. Surely that was all that really mattered.

‘Should probably get some presents on the go,’ she mumbled to herself, wandering off to look out over the mountain at the forest below. Watching for any sign of the tribe; any smoke from a fire out there. There was a rustling squeak behind her.

‘Hey!’ she shouted at Fishbowl, who was wrestling with the tree to pull it out of the ground. ‘It’s not a weed!’ she had to pull the creature’s wrapping arms from the tree trunk and give it a push out of the way. ‘Leave it alone! No!’ she told Fishbowl firmly. ‘Go and... I don’t know, blow on a leaf or something! You’re ruining Christmas,’ she mumbled grumpily, checking her tree for damage. ‘Carry on like that and you’re not getting a present,’ she called after it, as Fishbowl floated away. As if it understood anything I just said, Tabitha told herself. But she couldn’t not give Fishbowl a present; of course she had to. It was Christmas.

Later she took Seven out for another day’s search, but the tribe was still nowhere to be found. Were they wandering the plains like nomads maybe, far out of the invaders’ reach? Or – more likely – hiding in deeper and more secret caves, to wait out the winter in safety?

There was no sign of the invaders either; not since their confrontation on the plain. Though that was no guarantee that they weren’t just mining elsewhere on this world.

The peoples she’d seen on the further plains and marshes seemed to be in hiding too; any distant bronze figures she caught sight of in the trees quickly vanished when they saw her flying closer. The few marsh-dwellers she spotted looked ready to kill her if she landed, like she was just another invader.

I guess I am, she told herself, as she swept Seven on above. But most of the natives had disappeared without a trace; no matter how closely Seven flew to the ground, over and over, staring with his keen augmented sight. She just hoped that Cave Clan were still alive.

‘I know,’ she told Seven sadly, when he said they’d just have to keep trying.

When she finally set down on the mountain that evening, her eyes aching from scanning the rolling ground all day, Tabitha felt drained. Defeated. The sun vanished in a grey-green zombie sky. Feeding the campfire by her glowing night garden, she flicked on the wrist screen again, and tried to learn all she could from those random videos from outer space.

28

‘Captain Atha, sir. Private Jirran’s missing wristcom is back online again,’ said a junior officer, in one of two unmarked starships orbiting the planet. ‘It looks like whatever has it, is... using it.’

‘Using it? For what?’ said the blue-skinned captain, walking across the ship’s bridge to study the terminal screen.

‘...Watching videos, sir.’

‘Hm. Looks like something down there evolved a brain cell,’ the captain replied.

‘Should I shut the wristcom down, sir?’ said the junior officer.

‘Leave it on,’ the captain replied. ‘Unlock the full civilian star net. Let them see everything.’

‘Sir?’ said the scaled junior officer, confused. ‘I thought we were under priority-one orders for this to be a covert operation.’

‘That was before this covert operation led to a loss of life,’ the captain replied. ‘If there’s a fresh chance for negotiation, I want to take it. And out here, I give the orders. Is that clear?’

‘Yes sir.’

‘If whatever’s using that thing is intelligent it’ll start learning Trade Language. Eventually,’ said the captain, studying the junior’s screen to monitor which videos were being viewed. ‘If it can do that, it can negotiate. A negotiator, we can work with. Maybe even get a trade agreement out of this mess, instead of arrows and dead indigenous. And get this shithole planet mined and urbanised without losing any more of my crew.’

‘Yes sir,’ the junior officer replied, tapping away hurriedly at his holo-screen. Changing the network access permissions on the missing wristcom.

‘Whoa,’ Tabitha mumbled on the mountain, watching the wristcom screen suddenly come alive with pulsing webs of code. Thousands of symbols fluxed and flowed across the screen from its centre; it restarted with a flicker. The screen started up with a very different look; a new network full of ads and colour. A world away from the dour military operating system she’d been using so far. This was a commercial web; a civilian web. Somehow she had access to whatever alien culture was behind these invaders.

Tabitha’s first random search came back with images of alien dining utensils, based on whatever strange letters she’d just typed in.

‘Hmm,’ she said to herself, tapping the screen as she paced around the clearing. Typing another few strange symbols returned multiple images of a large green animal, native to a rust-coloured desert on another world, and apparently with questionable mating habits. A few random searches later, after somehow turning up images and videos of fashion, a somersaulting creature, giant dead things and how best to cook a scaled egg the size of her head, Tabitha’s mystified typing revealed alien images of a more explicit nature.

‘Haha! Gross,’ she muttered, typing in something else as she wandered off.

Glued to every new video she clicked on, Tabitha devoured all the information she could in case the connection dropped. As ever the language was a mystery to her, except for the small few words she’d heard over and over... but now there were other things she could learn too. A culture; how these people lived. Or rather, peoples. She stumbled on videos for job training. Cookery how-tos. Weird shots of green and gold juice that every alien celebrity seemed to be drinking; plugging their latest movies with brash music and eye-aching colours. Comedians and political debates streamed live to her screen from fantastical cities in who-knew-where. Tabitha soaked it all in, hungry for more. Knowledge was power in any game – especially if it came to saving lives and pushing these invaders back. What if this wasn’t accidental though, and the invaders wanted her to see all this on the screen? What if they were tracking her?... Who knew. There was an advanced world out there to learn from. Maybe more than one world, with so many races appearing in these videos. She had to learn everything she could. Most of all, she had to learn that damn language. If she could do that, she might even get them to stop this senseless invasion.

Tabitha was hooked on the screen that night. She studied its hi-tech glow by the crackling fire, among the bug-crawling rocks and her moonflowers’ eerie primal light. It was one of the biggest things to happen to her since the end of her own world; just to have information to hand. To feel connected, like there were things going on out there. She’d been a total internet addict back in her old life, and this new star net was the ultimate hit. Everything was on here. There were training videos for performing minor cranial surgery on six-limbed sentient amphibians. How to make a homemade birdbox of some kind, using a blue rubbery material she’d never seen before. Interviews with ancient species in their croaking dotage, reminiscing about the old days and how they ever survived a string of particularly horrifying wars. At least, that was what she guessed from the video clips. Pacing around her home on the mountain, she tried again to pick out the easiest ways in to the invaders’ language. Listening for repetitions. The a, the the, the is and its. How to say yes and no. It was a start.

‘So what’s the earpiece for?’ she muttered, pulling it out from a pouch in her belt. She wiggled the compact gadget into her ear and tapped it, and heard it make a cheery boop when it connected with the wristcom on her arm. The screen faded up to solid green; a little head symbol appeared and started making talky noises with a big wide mouth.

‘I’m supposed to talk?’ Tabitha tried, watching the head disappear and ripples spread across the screen like a pool. Visualising her tones.

‘I’m supposed to talk?’ the earpiece repeated, in a calm synthetic voice. Followed by a noise that said there was some mistake. An animated figure, a little icon man, popped up on the wristcom screen and said his alien name. The strange letters spelled out on the screen. Then he pointed to her, asking her name.

‘Tabitha,’ she tried.

‘Tabitha,’ the synthetic voice repeated happily in her earpiece. ‘Hello, Tabitha.’ She recognised the word for hello from all the videos she’d been watching.

‘Hello computer,’ she replied; a tiny smile growing as she sat in the screen’s warm glow.

‘Computer,’ the software repeated curiously, in that smooth plastic voice. A neat little line wiggled and peaked at the sounds; an audio display. The little figure reappeared, and asked her for the word for him.

‘You,’ Tabitha told him, settling down into the game. Rapt. ‘Me,’ she said, as the figure pointed to her. ‘Him. Her.’ The software went on for some time in its icon charades; learning the basics of Tabitha’s language and layering them together. Asking her to write the words out on the touchscreen. The prompting icons progressed from people, to actions, to objects.

‘Fruit,’ she said, as the next icon popped up. Spelling it out on the screen. ‘...Big fruit. ...Small fruit.’

A while later the software presented her with a full alphabet of her scrawled letters, collected from all the hundreds of words she’d spelled out, and ordered by the number of times they occurred.

‘This is brilliant,’ she mumbled to herself, lost in the game while Seven and Fishbowl slept. The software signalled that she now had to repeat after it.

‘Hello,’ said the synthetic voice in her earpiece. ‘Ehtai.’

‘Ehtai,’ Tabitha repeated. She got a happy ping from the software, and a smiley face on the screen. ‘Aw,’ she mumbled happily, revelling in her pat on the head. The familiar icon figure appeared on the screen again, and spoke out loud. Something in the alien language, called Trade Language; it was unintelligible. The earpiece listened and translated his words.

‘Hello Tabitha. You look great today,’ came the translation in her ear.

‘And you just got yourself a date, cartoon man,’ Tabitha replied happily. It asked her to fill the gaps in her reply, of the words it didn’t understand; asked her to repeat certain words and write them on the screen. Building up its algorithm, layer by layer, word by word, to translate more and more spoken Trade Language to English in her ear. She wasn’t just learning the software’s language; it was learning hers.

Suddenly it dawned on her. The invaders were bound to be tracking this wristcom. They had to be. They’d know exactly where she was.

Good. By the time you come down here to find me, I’ll know how to speak your language. And I’ll tell you to get the fuck off this planet. For now though... she had to find Cave Clan. She had to know if they were alright, after their home had been attacked.

‘Let’s try again,’ she sighed to Seven, switching off the software and climbing up into the cockpit. She fired up his engines and launched him off the mountaintop, searching again for the tribe.

29

The strange dizzy painkiller days after the operation had turned to weeks. And weeks. Hard to keep track of time here. The eight-foot creature had learned to breathe in his bizarre land-gills. Lungs, they called them. Their new Trade Language wasn’t particularly hard to learn, since he used it every day now; the challenge was forgetting the old sonar clicks and booms and whoops that made up his native language back home. And this place... this was a long way from home.

‘Fish! I don’t see you working!’ the overseer barked.

‘Sorry sir!’ the pale giant replied obediently, raising his pickaxe to smash the rockface apart. The jobs were ok here at the construction site; they didn’t work him as hard as he used to work himself. Everyone else on the gang had stared at his strength, that first couple of days. They said it was sheer muscle mass, and a lifetime of resistance training underwater. The bosses increased his daily quota when they saw he was clearing three and four times more rock than everyone else. His scales had scarred and thickened too, so he didn’t dehydrate so much any more. Just another part of his treatment, so they’d said.

He couldn’t believe how short they were, all these different peoples on the gang. Short and all different shapes and colours, from all kinds of worlds.

He didn’t even have to catch his own meals any more. Everyone got lunch breaks, and there was all the free fish he could eat. Dried, pre-frozen and tasteless, but it was food. At least it was guaranteed these days, and there wasn’t anyone else to think about now but himself. He stamped the sad painful thought back down; ignored the rage and the fury. Lifted up his oversized pickaxe and smashed the rockface apart, fast and hard like a piece of living machinery, in tremoring rock-flying chunks.

‘Shit, Fish,’ his green teammate grumbled, stepping away as he coughed and choked in the growing dust cloud.

‘What’s his problem?’ mumbled a grey-skinned man, working the opposite rockface. Nodding at the newcomer they called Big Fish.

‘Got forced to watch his family get tortured and killed. Honour killing, something like that,’ the small six-limbed woman replied behind him, repairing a beat-up mining drone. ‘One of those aquatic rescue jobs, like in the news. Ministry gave him new lungs for a fresh start.’ Her voice was a crackling buzz in her breather helmet.

‘A fresh start breaking rocks with killers?’ the grey man chuckled.

‘He’s a killer. ’

‘Yeah?’

‘Speared a cop right through.’

‘He never talks, how do you even know this stuff?’

‘It’s my business to know stuff.’

‘So what else do you know?’ said the man, watching the brute across the construction site. Still pounding the rockface to pieces and blunting his giant pickaxe, visibly, in the process.

‘Well, I know this place will be some kind of Guardian facility in a few weeks,’ the small woman replied, reaching into the old drone to slot in a replacement fusion unit. ‘I know there’s more worlds out there the Ministry want to prospect, and places like this are the Guardian bases for the initiative. And, I know that Fish guy’s reaching our quotas a hell of a lot faster than we were before him, so we’re back on schedule,’ she added, nodding across at him. The creature was still smashing and pounding and battering the rockface apart like something possessed.

‘Remind me never to piss that guy off,’ said the grey man.

‘Three times the workload for the price of a lung transplant,’ said the woman. ‘Strong, dumb, obedient and just glad to have steady meals. The Ministry loves guys like him.’

Exhausted, arms aching, the eight-foot creature laid into the rockface one final time and staggered back from the dust cloud, wiping his face with the back of his arm. Breathing hard; close to blacking out. He blinked his big eyes and saw stars, as he stared at the gloomy grey-green sky. A sudden memory stung in his mind; rippling light. Hot hard sunlight, through shallow water. Too shallow. Suffocating screams. His eyes glazed over as the flashbacks came. He breathed hard in alien lungs, his twin hearts pounding; the pale fins behind his head blushing and rising to a blood-red mane.

‘Fish, you dumb fuck!’ the overseer bellowed, storming over to him. ‘How many times do I need to shout your stupid-ass name!? Get back to work!’

‘...Sorry sir,’ the big creature rumbled, stamping down the sore sting of dishonour. Mane and stripes and burning rage all fading away, as quickly as they’d come. He raised up his pickaxe to smash it hard into the dustclouding rock.

30

Tabitha chalked a new day on the mountain rockface at sunrise; the thirty-first of January by the old Earthian calendar. All bound to be completely wrong on a new world... but at least it stops me going insane.

‘Hey, it’s Valentine’s Day in a couple of weeks,’ she told Fishbowl happily, as it drifted by to water its wildflower garden. Tabitha wiped her cold dribbling nose in the winter wind. ‘Don’t worry, I don’t want anything,’ she lied, watching Seven blink an eye open where he slept. Something told her that wasn’t going to work with them. Sighing, she stretched and yawned and made her fur bed, and put the wood-woven door back on her hut. The inside walls were much thicker now, and lit softly with small blooms; she’d been breeding moonflowers to layer the walls against the bitter cold. Later she’d shored up the outside walls with stones and thick sculpted branches, and knifed up turf to tile it all over. A lawn-covered igloo. Maybe it could use a storeroom off the bedroom lounge though, she considered. Well, no point freezing my arse off up here in one little hovel.

Handwashing her body with boiled snow, and shivering back into her catsuit with steaming breaths, Tabitha smiled to see the skywhales floating by in the distance. The big-bellied whale was a mum now; their calf swam through the air alongside. Grazing on trees in peaceful demolition. She’d seen the new family more and more over the past few weeks, since she’d killed that glowing mollusc tree. Guessed there was nothing to trap and eat them any more.

‘Oi, wake up,’ she called to Seven. ‘We’re going soon.’ Every day, she set out with him on their search. Every day, neither those invaders nor the bloody Cave Clan were anywhere to be found. It was like everyone had upped and left this world, no matter where they flew, and it was just her and her monsters now. But at least Seven was looking much healthier these days. A few weeks of rest and basking and his daily flights, and his sore flayed cockpit looked almost as good as new.

‘Ehtai. Haan, ya-dehfastata, Tabitha,’ she told Fishbowl brightly, showing off her Trade Language. ‘Proctu. Teyva, stasi-ahsent?’ she was crouching alongside the creature to check the neat wildflower beds for weeds. There weren’t any, of course. Fishbowl would never allow it.

‘That means, hello, my name is Tabitha,’ she added. ‘And you look well, can I get you anything?’ Fishbowl didn’t care. ‘I’m teaching myself on this little wrist tablet I found,’ she told it, for the millionth time. ‘Yep, pretty impressive, I know.’ Well, it’s not like I’d get any praise from these two. Just like every morning, she flicked the wristcom back on and got to work practising new sentences. The language software had been learning from her every day, building and refining its algorithm over weeks. Presenting certain photos and artworks to describe particular thoughts and feelings, in the English sounds and letters she’d taught it. Verbs, nouns, adjectives... colours, objects, people... layering up the understanding between them. Immersing her in Trade Language through conversation, every day, over and over again.

‘Storm’s coming,’ she told Fishbowl, glancing up; watching the black clouds gather over the mountains. A threatening gloom that filled half the sky, like nothing she’d ever seen on Earth.

As ever, she waited out the world’s next biblical storm from her hut. Watching the wind-howling, god-growling thundering chaos from her warm shelter; saw a rounded patch of the raining world through the dripping doorway. She fed the flames in a small stone fire pit, set into the ground inside her hut. The smoke escaped through a little hole in the roof; a new feature that she’d learned to add the hard way. Lightning split the sky in a glowing vein and broke in thunder that filled the bay. Pounding rain clattered on the world in driving sheets; pockmarking the wind-trembling lake. Tabitha smiled to watch Fishbowl struggle past the doorway in the howling wind, walking slowly on its arms; rainsoaked like gleaming black rubber. Determined as ever to carry on gardening. Seven would be right up on the summit, or flaring his jets to fly through the storm itself. She’d asked his thoughts a few weeks back, why he always had to be up there in the booming thunder and bright fierce lightning. He just liked it, he’d said, all that fury and chaos; he couldn’t explain why.

Tabitha and Seven landed in the forest as the storm passed, and she headed into the dripping burnt-out home caves. Still fire-blackened and abandoned. No sign of the tribe in weeks. Where the hell were they hiding? If they’d been taken by the invaders, why hadn’t Seven seen ships, or a prison? If they’d been killed, why couldn’t they find their remains? Glancing around, turning to leave, Tabitha heard quiet sawing and froze in shock. Looked back and glimpsed a tiny red glow. A fire, flickering to life. Huddled around the smouldering hearth, their fur black with mud and camouflaged in the charred caves, the tribe had come back. When she came closer, all she saw were angry stares. Deep Roots shot to his feet to warn her. Sea Mist was overjoyed to see her, but shouting at her to get away.

‘I’ve been looking everywhere for you,’ she told them urgently, putting out her hands in surrender. ‘I’m here to help you. I swear.’ But they didn’t seem to see it that way. They probably thought she’d had something to do with this attack on their home; that she was a witch after all. Or even just the truth of it; that she’d abandoned them because she couldn’t handle being their leader, when she could have saved them and their home. Suddenly Stone Shore’s retainers were up and running for her, knives out. Before any of them could grab her she lashed out, flooring one with a punch and shocking another, and broke into a sprint toward the crowd.

Fine, Tabitha told herself, as she met Stone Shore’s wrathful gaze. If you want to play it that way, let’s go. The scared villagers scattered, and there he was. Mighty King Stone Shore, getting to his feet in front of her. For a split-second he hesitated when he saw the fierceness in her eyes, and charged for her. Tabitha took a running leap and cracked him on the jaw. Spun snarling as he staggered, and kicked his knee out to tackle him in the dirt. When he fought back she gripped his wrist and shocked him. He yelled and struggled, rabid and indignant at this fresh insult. She shocked him harder. And again. Forced voltage into his arm until he shook and growled and dropped stunned on the ground. There were confused barks and yells from the tribe around them; Tabitha made sure they could see her fight for leadership. But putting him on the ground wasn’t enough. She had to seal her dominance, or she’d be fighting and bickering with Stone Shore right up until the invaders came to kill them. But they could unite, and fight back. They had to, and Stone Shore couldn’t see it. All he saw in her was witch. Shocking him into submission, Tabitha pulled the glass knife from her belt and pressed it against the fur of his throat. He stopped struggling beneath her. She glanced around as the tribe drew in closer. Made sure they could see what was about to happen. That she was alpha; that she would lead. She stared deep into Stone Shore’s cold eyes, pressing the knife as hard as she dared against his throat. All around her, the tribe were grunting and staring. Growling and yelling. Standing there with the power of life and death in her hands, Tabitha finally understood. This was their Ancient Way. The stronger killed the weaker rival to lead the people; their best chance to survive. That’s how it was. All around her, the tribe’s barks had grown to a ragged chant. Spurring her on to do the deed. To kill him. Stone Shore knelt at her feet, staring and stern. Awaiting his good death. Tabitha tightened her grip on the knife. She ran through the act in her head. One hard slice, steady as a rock. That’s all it’ll take. Breathing deep... she lowered the knife, and dropped him with one last solid punch. Stared hard into his eyes where he lay.

‘You belong to me now,’ she told him. ‘I’m in charge. Do you understand?’ He studied her words; her expression. ‘Do you understand?’ she asked him again. Slowly, hatefully, Stone Shore nodded that he knew what was happening. When she stood up and gave him space to get to his feet, he backed away. A sudden bark broke the heavy silence; another joined it. And another. The village boomed with barking voices. For the second time, she’d fought Stone Shore and won. She was alpha. Only this time, she had a reason. She was going to lead them; protect them. Stone Shore looked ready to kill her. He was welcome to try. Tabitha turned at the sound of footsteps; it was Deep Roots. He looked at her solemnly, and for a second time he knelt at her feet. Sea Mist joined him, and the outcast Barkless Tree. Then White Cloud and Raging Flame, and the rest quickly followed. Tabitha touched their outstretched hands to accept them under her rule. There was no hesitation this time, as the tribe knelt around her. They were her friends, her family here; she’d do whatever it took to protect them. She’d earned her name with them. Now, she was their queen.

‘No, stay there and pass the rocks down the line. That’s it,’ Tabitha told them, as she led the work to clear the rubble from their homes. This wasn’t something they were going to fix in a day or two; half the terraces had been blasted to nothing. There was just too much destruction.

‘Take her outside,’ she told Raging Flame, signing to him, as White Cloud broke down in tears at the ruins. Their sacred home since ancient times. ‘The rest of you, get back to it. Let’s get this done.’

Later she checked on the charred caves close to the big hearthfire, which were getting cleared faster. More of the tribe had joined in with the work here. Just to see a little progress in all the devastation, she supposed, but this sacred place meant more to them too. Cleaning up the flaming spirit-heart of their home. As little Summer Rain lifted away the biggest rock he could manage, it set something beeping beneath. He looked up at his father curiously, searching for the sound. Everyone was looking around for the source of the strange call they’d never heard before. They couldn’t know.

‘Get away!’ Tabitha screamed, barging through them to get to the beeping sound in the fallen rocks. ‘Get away!’ she yelled desperately, clawing at the rocks and stones for the bomb. Her frantic digging revealed a grey metal shape; she dragged it from the rockpile and threw it as hard as she could into an empty corner of the caves. She had to grab Summer Rain just to stop him chasing it; he was laughing like it was a game. Tabitha turned him away; clamped her hands on his ears and shielded him with her body. The mine blew with a deafening bang behind them, hurling dust and thrashing rocks against the walls. Panicked screams and shouts were ringing raw in her ears. Summer Rain yelped in terror and wriggled free of her hands. All around her the tribe were running and howling in fear as a fresh landslide came crashing down in the caves. Running for the entrance before the falling rocks buried them inside.

‘Everyone, out!’ Tabitha yelled to the groups on the terraces, over the painful ringing in her ears. ‘Get outside! Now!’ Some just stood in horrified confusion after the bomb; trying to work out how bare rubble could burst like a volcano. Once the panic spread though, and there was more sudden beeping in more piles of rock, everyone was running for the opening to get outside. Another sudden bang beside the screaming crowd as they escaped.

When Tabitha staggered through the tunnel into the blinding daylight, the last one out, she saw Stone Shore sat in the dirt with his back to her. The tribe yelled and screamed when the ground shook, and thundering explosives inside destroyed the caves completely. But Stone Shore barely reacted. He was covered head to toe in dust and blood, just sitting there on the grass. Breathing heavily in the silence.

‘Stone Shore?’ Tabitha said warily, coming closer. She felt herself tensing up; her claws slid out silently for another fight. As she came around him though, she saw a cub in his arms; a little girl. The cute little girl who’d waved to her that first day; the one with no name. Pale and lifeless in his big arms. When Stone Shore looked up at her in silence, tears shone and dropped from those hard eyes of his. The child’s body looked so frail and limp in his huge hands, and he was powerless to do anything about it. Absolutely lost. As Tabitha stepped closer though, and slowly put a hand on his shoulder while he grieved, she couldn’t see any sign of injury on the little girl.

‘...She’s unconscious,’ she mumbled to Stone Shore; more to herself. Thought back to that first aid course she’d had to take a long, long time ago. She didn’t have a clue; she’d never actually had to use what they’d taught her. I have to try.

‘Lay her down,’ Tabitha told him urgently, trying to rouse him by the shoulder. ‘Stone Shore!’ he snapped out of his grief with a sudden stare. ‘Lay her down on the grass,’ she said, signing toward the ground. Tapping her chest. ‘I’ll try to help her.’ She was sure he’d resist her, whatever she told him to do. But things were different now. She was alpha, after all. Tears running down his scarred face, he lay the girl’s body down with total obedience.

‘God, I hope this works,’ Tabitha muttered. There was no breath from the little girl; no pulse or heartbeat from what she could tell. Putting one hand on top of the other on the cub’s chest, she pumped her palms gently on her heart. Sudden silence as people crowded around to watch. Stone Shore stared nearby; half furious and half fascinated at what the hell she was doing.

‘Come on,’ Tabitha urged the girl, floating on adrenalin, moving to give her CPR breaths. Had to cup her hands around her wide marsupial mouth to keep the air in at the sides. She blew five lungfuls; she didn’t know if that was right. She couldn’t remember, that first aid course was so long ago. More likely that she was just copying the movies.

‘Come on,’ she growled desperately, moving again to gently pump the little girl’s chest. It was the longest silence she’d ever known. A crowd of people watching, wordless. As if the witch Dark Storm was trying to cast a spell. Tabitha moved to give the little girl breaths again. Five deep lungfuls. Moved to pump her chest again. One, two, three, four, five... she didn’t know how many to give. This wasn’t working. She felt the panic setting in; this was all on her now. Moved to give her breaths again. One, two, thr – suddenly the little girl was coughing. Gasping for breath. Blinking and muttering her tiny tearful voice at the bright blue sky; desperately reaching out her hands for safety. Wailing to her rushing dad and whimpering in his big arms. As he grabbed up his daughter to hold her close, Stone Shore made sounds Tabitha had never expected to hear from the cold hard bastard. Laughing barks to the sky above. Joy. Relief. Love. All of a sudden the crowd was alive with whoops and howls, jostling in close to see the miracle for themselves. To see Dark Storm’s magic that’d brought one of their own back from the dead. Someone was trying to rouse Tabitha from her shocked silence; she couldn’t believe it’d worked. Deep Roots was shaking her shoulder, laughing with his creased old grin; dark Barkless Tree chattering eagerly beside him. Sea Mist too, smiling in wonder at her. Taking her hands, her sides, and lifting her up. More hands; tough and strong. Taking hold of her legs to raise her over the happy crowd. All the tribe, holding her up above them, cheering for her. Before she knew it, Tabitha was grinning. She was surprised she even remembered how to, it felt so rare these days. Cave Clan crowded around her, shouting her name in their loud rough words. Dark Storm. Scrambling to touch her magic hands. Singing and whooping to the forest and the bright sky, and the red-haired witch and her great black bird spirit who’d come down to help them. Chanting those names. Dark Storm. Queen.

31

Stone Shore changed that day. Later he came back to Tabitha in the clearing and knelt in front of her. The people were gathering to watch in silence.

‘What are you doing?’ Tabitha chuckled nervously, watching him. Stone Shore said nothing; just gripped the pale tattered scarf of animal hide around his neck and tore it away. He lay his knife down in the dirt at her feet, and looked her in the eyes with sad silent pride. She didn’t need to speak their language to know what was happening. The way he knelt, holding her gaze... the way everyone stared all around them... he was pledging himself to her. His willing surrender. The man was giving her his life’s work; his tribe. Everything he’d ever fought for to keep them safe and strong.

Imagine what he’s going through, she thought. This was a world of demons now; one he didn’t understand. Demons who could reach into his home unseen, and take his little girl away from him with their magic. He was lost. Looking to her for help, for guidance, just like the rest. The miners and mercenaries out there had the power to take everything from these people; to steal their entire future. She could stop them... if she chose to. If only she could ignore that same frightened temptation to leave, and just not get caught up in all this.

Stop running, she told herself. Leaving Earth to the Watchers was a terrible mistake. But I don’t have to repeat it. Tabitha took a shaking breath. There wasn’t any decision to make. She just knew; it was the right thing to do. It’s what a Ghost should do.

Stone Shore was looking up at her; about to give up on his offer in utter shame. Tabitha didn’t know what ceremony he was looking for. All she did was what felt natural, and put a hard hand on his shoulder.

‘Stand up,’ she said, smiling. ‘...Would you be my retainer? Please?’ she tried uncertainly, handing his knife back. Trying to sign what she meant. Stone Shore showed the tiniest hint of a smile; just in the eyes. He sheathed his knife, and got up to stand beside her like a bodyguard. With the smallest nod towards the tribe, he told her to take the lead.

‘...I’ll help you,’ she told the crowd, as they watched quietly. ‘I’ll fight for you,’ she said, raising her fist to her chest so they understood. ‘I’ll be whatever you need me to be.’

The old her would have paced around panicking about what to do next, completely overwhelmed. But that wasn’t her any more. Whistling up to the crags nearby, she and the tribe watched Seven’s hunched gargoyle shape come sweeping down over the forest. Seven soared overhead, circled on his vast rectangular wings, and landed with a tremor that shook the ground under their feet. Some of the cubs were terrified of him, shrieking and clinging to their parents’ legs. But as Tabitha walked out to stroke Seven’s snout, she saw that none of the adults in the tribe showed their fear. They wouldn’t look Seven in his big white eyes, but they refused to run or back down at the sight of him. Either they revered him as a bird spirit, like Deep Roots said... or they just refused to back out of a fight with anything. Tabitha smiled at the thought as she looked back at them.

‘This is Seven,’ she told them, tapping her fist on his chest to sign his name. ‘Seven.’

‘Sseven?’ a few repeated in the crowd, walking nearer.

‘Come closer, it’s ok,’ she assured them, waving them on. ‘He’s an attention seeker. He loves it.’ Deep Roots was the first to come forward and put a leathery palm on Seven’s snout. Stroking his warm black scales in reverent silence, smiling widely. A few more followed his lead and came closer; reaching out to pat Seven’s paving-slab scales. Tabitha glanced at little Summer Rain, clearly thinking about it.

‘Come on, it’s ok,’ she told him, waving him on. Pushing out of the crowd, setting his jaw in determination, the little boy marched on towards Seven and planted his hand firmly on the monster’s snout. With the tiniest nudge, Seven knocked the boy down on his backside. Laughing, Summer Rain immediately got up and shoved Seven right back. Growled at him in his high clear boisterous voice. Seven growled back. Laughing, Summer Rain growled louder. Seven replied with a growl that vibrated in everyone’s chests, as they watched the pair with growing smiles. Summer Rain took a deep breath and roared at Seven as loud as he could, filling the forest clearing. Seven wouldn’t be outdone, and took a monstrous breath. Raised his head high with a great thundering roar that filled the world. The tribe clamped their hands on their ears in shock; felt it trembling through their chests. When Tabitha took her hands off her ears and looked back at the tribe, they were cheering. Calling to the sky in wild celebration, and chanting Seven’s name as they crowded round. Tabitha realised then that they really did follow strength; they worshipped power. Their best chance at survival in this cold hard place. In Seven they’d found their war-spirit, to drive the demons back.

Tabitha sat in thought. It wasn’t safe in the caves, clearly. The invaders had found their home there and tried to wipe them out.

‘Where can we go?’ she mumbled to herself, watching mothbirds flit and dive in the cold blue sky. Followed their flight around, past Sacred Mountain in the distance. That was the thing to do, wasn’t it? To get to high ground, get a better view of the battlefield? That was what the Ghosts did, back on Earth. Well... they had a castle too, admittedly. Wait, she thought. If I can grow a hut out of nothing...

‘Hey, Deep Roots,’ she called to him, waving him over to one side. Scratching her plan in the dirt where they sat together. She pointed at Seven and put her hands out to mime his flapping wings; pointed at Sacred Mountain where she’d grown her hut halfway up. Tried to explain that they’d be safer up there. Deep Roots didn’t question her. He just smiled and obeyed, and took the message back to the tribe with Tabitha beside him.

Deep Roots prepared the tribe for what came next, as best he could. They stepped into Seven’s open claws fearlessly, two people in each, and he gently closed his square toes around them. As soon as he lifted off though, and soared away for the mountain, Tabitha heard them yelling in terror with rollercoaster screams. She had to turn away from the tribe as they watched Seven’s shrinking shape with concern, trying her best not to laugh at the frightened screams high above them.

I’m a bad person, she told herself. But it’s just so bloody funny.

Seven swept back down within a couple of minutes to take the next four up the mountain; parents holding an excited Summer Rain closely as they stepped into Seven’s claw. As they lifted off, Summer Rain’s scream was more excitement than terror; shrinking away to nothing as Seven carried them up to the mountain.

It didn’t take long for the tribe to dwindle down in the forest. Already there was a fire smoking halfway up Sacred Mountain, with tiny busy figures gathering to feed the flames. When the last three climbed into Seven’s claws, he lowered his neck for Tabitha to take the saddle.

‘Good work,’ she told him warmly, patting his neck as the harness grew around her. One last look at the forest to make sure she hadn’t left anyone behind. ‘Let’s go.’

Climbing down from Seven to let him rest in the mountain clearing, Tabitha saw Barkless Tree coming over.

‘We haven’t really had chance to speak yet, have we?’ she said cheerily, sitting down with him by the campfire. ‘Well, speak is kind of a loose term. But you don’t understand what I’m saying anyway, do you?’ The dark-furred male just shrugged to say that he didn’t understand. Tabitha chuckled. He was interested in her abilities though; fascinated to watch her send blackening branches of voltage through a wet stick. He reached out to touch her sparking hands.

‘That’s probably not a good idea,’ she laughed, moving her hands away. ‘But wait til you see what I can do with those flowers,’ she said, pointing out the glowing blooms. ‘It’ll blow your mind.’

That afternoon strangers appeared on the mountain slopes; Tabitha’s Cave Clan were howling and barking at them in warning. Tabitha walked out and put a stop to it though, as soon as she recognised them. They were bronze-furred, carrying bows and spears. It was the tribe she’d met on the plains, when the invaders had been mining for gold. The people caught in that horrifying massacre, for defending their homeland.

‘We don’t come to fight,’ their weary leader told Deep Roots; a tall female. She was followed mostly by the old and sick, and a dozen haunted children. ‘We only come to thank the sky woman there. The red-mane. We owe our lives to her.’

‘Leave us!’ Stone Shore called out harshly. ‘We have no peace with you!’

‘No, it’s alright,’ said Tabitha, as she came forward to meet them. Glancing around at the survivors. ‘...But there were more of you, before,’ she said, trying to sign to the woman about the small size of the group at her back. There’d been more people than this on the plain, after the fighting. Deep Roots took her meaning, and translated. With a hard sad stare, the bronze-furred woman raised her palm to the sky. The rest had gone to the spirits; wounded deeply during the fighting. Nothing could heal the wounds that’d been burned through them.

‘Dead?’ Tabitha replied, shocked. Eyes wide, lost in thought, she looked back at the sorry survivors. It was the least she could do to help them. ‘Join us,’ she said, motioning them towards the warmth of the fire. ‘Eat with us. Come on,’ she told them with a sad smile, leading them over to rest.

‘...Your witch-queen welcomes us into your Sky Tribe?’ said the bronze female, walking to the fire uncertainly, asking those around her to make sure it wasn’t a trick.

‘We are Cave Clan!’ Stone Shore snapped angrily; an issue of pride. Watching them argue though, and expecting the confrontation to get as bloody as they ever did, the dark outcast Barkless Tree came forward to greet the bronze newcomers warmly. Surely the time for in-fighting was over; it’d ruled their lives for a thousand years. The clan names didn’t matter any more; surely they were all just one people under First Ancestor? A sudden thought struck him like a revelation; a thought that no one had ever had before.

The Greater Tribe. True, the outsiders from the Plain Clan used the wrong names for them; Sky Woman. Sky Tribe. But those were names with bigger meaning than Dark Storm and Cave Clan. Stronger meaning, for uncertain times. The kind of titles to unite a single greater tribe, against a single enemy. To survive that enemy, first the clans had to stop fighting between themselves.

‘You are all welcome to join the Sky Tribe,’ Barkless Tree told them happily, much to Stone Shore’s quiet anger. Sky Tribe? What was this new blasphemy? He’d already cast out Barkless Tree for his dangerous notions; a strange man without the hardy shields of honour and tradition to protect him. He was open to the wind and rain and rot of strange new thoughts. A barkless tree.

‘All clans are welcome under our leader,’ Barkless Tree told the newcomers happily, his mind racing toward another new idea. ‘She came from the stars, on the great bird spirit you see here, to protect us. She is the Sky Queen.’

32

When Tabitha searched for Barkless Tree later and asked where he was, no one knew. Apparently he’d just walked away down the mountain without a word to anyone. Judging by people’s shrugs though, that was just something he did. Maybe being an outcast agreed with him.

Watching the tribe, Tabitha saw a few searching for gaps in the mountainside. Looking for shelter against the high bitter wind. She studied her hut, and glanced at the clearing. She could grow a home for them here; maybe the first building they’d ever seen. Yeah, she’d be interfering with this culture, and how it developed; but she didn’t see a race or a species any more. She saw people and their children, homeless and afraid. Watching the skies constantly and waiting for the demons to come back. Alien technology had already hit this Stone Age world now, in the worst possible way.

Sod evolution, Tabitha told herself. I have to help them.

Tabitha had a growing audience as she worked. She fed her strange dark flowers into stems and trunks, one by one. Grew the trunks into solid beams, right around the clearing. She shot her current into the structures and pulled at them, and gradually walled off the giant posts with webbed black vines. It needed more height though; the whole wooden skeleton looked solid but far too stunted. She just didn’t have the voltage in her to do it.

She strained to reach up, to grow it, and the trunk posts creaked and stretched a little taller. She tried to climb up where the two biggest trunks should’ve met, in a big curved arch. But it was no use. Defeated, embarrassed, she couldn’t look back at the tribe. It wasn’t the fortress she’d been hoping for; more like a circle of messy windbreaks. Suddenly she felt herself pushed and lifted from behind; scooped up on Seven’s stubby snout. Tabitha grinned as she steadied herself, while Seven craned his long neck to lift her up to the roof beams. When she held the nearest beam to push the last of her energy into it, it grew monstrously. It was Seven’s giant current, running through her like a conduit. That supermassive voltage he’d been basking into his scales every day. She felt it rushing through her body, like a powerplant beneath her feet. She felt the whole wooden structure stretch and swell; heard the watching tribe gasp and chatter at the miracle. The stunted foundations creaked and grew to a giant ribbed frame; a spiny black colossus on the mountainside. Their haven from the bitter cold, and the invaders out there beyond their land.

That’s it, she thought, as Seven lowered her to the ground. That’s its name. Havenhall. Dark and rough and grown from the dirt, and solid as the mountain it was rooted in. A safe place.

As the tribe settled in over the next couple of days, Tabitha worked with Seven to grow and shape their new home. It was bulkier now; more imposing. A stark black construct on the mountainside, lit with a ghostly glow behind its ribs and rafters. Sea Mist and Deep Roots had led the work to make the place into a home, and now a big hearthfire glowed warmly beneath ragged sky-blue banners inside. Stone Shore was in his element too, bossing the tribe around as Tabitha’s retainer. Sending out hunting parties down the mountain, or commanding the tribe to tidy back the wild from the clearing.

Barkless Tree returned that afternoon. He patted a heavy hand on Tabitha’s shoulder, as she strengthened one of the hall columns with extra volts.

‘Hm? Oh, there you are,’ she said. ‘Where did you disappear to?’ He was just smiling; looking away across the clearing. Following his gaze, Tabitha stared at more newcomers making their way up the slope. But this wasn’t a small group, like the survivors they’d already welcomed in. This was a never-ending line; a tribe bigger than her own. Bronzebacks. Sky Tribe fell silent all around her, watching them climb the slope. The new arrivals stared up at Havenhall as they came closer. Watching Seven perched on the roof in fascination, as if they’d heard stories about him. They were taller and leaner than Cave Clan; Barkless Tree signed to Tabitha that they were spear hunters from the wide plains. That they had suffered, and seen their homes burn. The alpha came to stand before her; a tall scarred male with a look as fierce as Stone Shore. In the sudden heavy silence he beat a single booming thump on his chest with rough knuckles; dust flew from his fur in the streaming sunlight. Fixing Tabitha with a hard stare that made her stomach twist nervously. Was he here to fight her?

‘Oshk’ha,’ Deep Roots told her quietly, nodding to the newcomer.

‘Blood? Something blood?’ Tabitha replied. Deep Roots added a fast smooth motion with a flat hand. Swift. Swift Blood.

‘This is the Life-Hands?’ the newcomer asked Barkless Tree, in his deep hard voice. ‘The demon who fights with you?’ Barkless nodded beside her.

‘She is no demon,’ Stone Shore growled defensively. ‘Mind your tongue before I take it from you.’ The new alpha took on a wild angry look; snarled a challenge at Stone Shore.

‘She is spirit-born,’ Deep Roots assured him, smiling calmly. ‘She has been named.’ Swift Blood looked at him, and seemed satisfied. The tall alpha sighed proudly, heavily, and thought on Barkless Tree’s words. First Ancestor had strived for unity, it was true. He abhorred foolish pride. If there was ever a time for a greater leader, a greater unity... so be it.

‘...Kha V’haa,’ Swift Blood growled to Tabitha, low and gravelly. She knew that word; that was what Deep Roots had called her when they’d first met. Struggling with the human sounds. Tabitha. The tall alpha knelt before her, his knuckles pressed hard into the dirt. All around him, the Bronzebacks followed suit. Kneeling to her. Tabitha didn’t know what to do; she hadn’t really had anyone kneel to her before. These days it seemed to be happening more and more. Deep Roots grunted quietly behind her, off to one side. Ignoring her staring audience to glance back at him quickly, Tabitha watched him mime a rising motion with his hand.

‘Oh right,’ she said quietly, giving Roots a quick grateful smile. ‘Erm... rise,’ she told the tall Bronzeback uncertainly, raising her hand. Standing up, staring at her, Swift Blood picked up his spear and took hold of the carved totems that dangled from the head. He snapped them off and threw them down in the dirt, and stared expectantly. Sad and proud.

‘Er...,’ Tabitha said uncertainly, looking again to Deep Roots. He was quick though, much to her relief. Taking off his own rough blue scarf, he tied it quickly around the alpha’s spear and backed away reverently. Satisfied, the Bronzeback raised his newly coloured spear and drummed the end into the dirt. The ground trembled with a thundering thump when the rest of his vast clan followed suit. Tabitha didn’t need to know their language to understand the fierce intent in their eyes. Their spears were hers now. They were Sky Tribe.

Tabitha sat and watched the growing tribe around several fires that night, eating and talking. Chewing that painkilling root. Stone Shore had wanted to set the clans to work; Barkless Tree had suggested that they all just sit together and eat. A time for the separate clans to come together and grow, gradually, less separate.

It was working, too. Tabitha sat silently and watched how the differing clans spoke with one another. Cold and mutually respectful at first, unless that was hostility. But as they ate and relaxed, and quick comments grew slowly to conversation, and a funny story got an unexpected laugh, she saw them open up. Barkless Tree made sure there was no shortage of that root going around either, the crafty bugger. An hour or so later, conversations had grown to loud stories and debates. Proud parents boasting loudly about how well their cubs could hunt and fight. Old timers, bronze and brown, chattering and head-shaking in dismay at how cold the winters were getting, then laughing toothlessly at some sudden joke. A while later, she watched smiling as sworn adversaries from the caves and plains danced and sung like one clan around the great hearthfire.

Watching them whoop and kick around the fire, Tabitha had to remind herself that this was all Barkless Tree’s doing... and the release they all needed, too. Things were changing way too fast for these people, but they knew food and stories and dancing, and they flocked to them. Those mercenaries were still out there, somewhere. Probably just tearing up the ground somewhere else, stealing whatever wealth they could get. For now, she told herself. No way they’re getting away with this.

She saw that Barkless Tree was attracting retainers of his own now; a couple of quiet outcasts from the Bronzeback clan. He was instructing them; leading them off down the mountain. Sending them separate ways, like messengers, into the night.

Awkward, exhausted, Tabitha politely turned down an offer to join the dancing around the hearthfire, and found a quiet corner to rest in. She sat it out in the shadows and politely refused another offer, until Raging Flame walked over and hoisted her up from the ground.

‘It’s fine, honestly,’ she chuckled politely, with all the Britishness she could muster. Pleasantly trying to shrug and smile her way out of it. As he shoved her into the fray though, and the rest drunkenly cheered her arrival, Tabitha realised that these people had a very different idea of what a queen should be. That getting funky was her royal duty. It wasn’t a hard dance to learn; just a mix of small kicks and claps as they circled the bonfire and sang. They were all still chewing that painkilling root; lots of it. Every other person was pressing some into Tabitha’s hands for her to chew. Slowly loosening up as she realised no one cared how she danced, and that they were just happy to have her there, Tabitha let herself get into it. She chewed more root, grinning at its floating joyful feeling in her head. Joining in with her tribe when they howled at the stars. Drumming, dancing and singing around the crackling fire in the night.

33

The new tribe Barkless Tree led back the next day were an altogether different breed.

Red-eyes, Deep Roots explained, without his usual cheer. Tabitha had seen them before, but not up close; the ones who lived in the swamps. The ones she’d seen mobbing that animal, to eat it alive. Their fur was much thinner; so much so that their bald black scales or pale white hides showing through made them look like entirely different species. Every one of them with those same red-pink albino eyes. Stone Shore didn’t have a good word to say about them. As Tabitha glanced around at everyone’s faces in the tense silence, it looked like Barkless was the only one happy about their arrival.

‘Welcome,’ Tabitha told them in Stormish, hoping she’d pronounced it right, and left the rest to Deep Roots. The old man listened carefully to the clan’s dark-scaled leader, nodding at her gruff words.

‘What did she say?’ Tabitha asked Deep Roots, once their alpha had fallen silent. He looked at her and shrugged helplessly. He didn’t know either. ‘O-k...,’ Tabitha mumbled, standing there awkwardly. ‘Well, come in anyway,’ she said happily, waving them on to follow her into the clearing. ‘I’ll show you round.’

Tabitha didn’t need to be a local to feel the fresh tension in the tribe. The Red-eyes seemed polite enough, and kept to themselves; she would’ve liked to think that this frosty reception wasn’t about the way they looked. But she’d be lying if she said their hunting methods hadn’t disturbed her, from what she’d glimpsed above the marsh. Maybe all those cold stares in the crowd were about how they lived.

Come nightfall, the black and white newcomers formed a kneeling circle in the clearing to pray to the moon. Chanting some raw-throated dirge to their daggers, before they filed out to hunt in the cold black night. The live animals they brought back they killed slowly, on a flat stone in the moonlight, with too much ritual for the Bronzebacks’ taste. Cave Clan were reluctant around them too; their own hunts were genteel by comparison. Stone Shore’s people killed whatever they caught on the spot, nice and quick, and thanked its spirit once it was dead. The Red-eyes though... they found some kind of religious experience in prolonging their prey’s death and suffering. Like the sacrifice was worth more than the food itself.

It all came to a head when Stone Shore burst into the hall to find Tabitha, ranting angry words that she couldn’t understand. When he led her outside a crowd had gathered around the Red-eyes’ killing stone, arguing with them. They were holding down a young faun, cutting it; seemingly ready to skin it alive. They seemed to enjoy it too, like a game. It was crying, long and loud and helpless.

‘Stop!’ Tabitha yelled out, her words echoing in the sudden silence. The gathered Red-eyes looked at her in shock; the only sounds were the faun’s panicked calls in the moonlight. ‘If you’re hungry, then kill that poor thing and eat it,’ Tabitha told them angrily. The Red-eyes around the shrieking faun were just staring. They went back to their ceremony. All eyes on her, Tabitha steeled herself and walked across the clearing. She pushed past them, tried to switch off to the deed, and stunned the faun stiff with her current. Hoping she’d numbed it, she pushed her knife in the back of its head, between the ears, and killed it instantly. She cut its neck to bleed out quickly. Tabitha wiped her bloody glass knife on her furs and sheathed it, and tried to keep down her sick horror long enough to get the words out.

‘This is Sky Tribe,’ she growled at them angrily, as Deep Roots translated beside her. ‘You kill food like we do. Quick.’ They listened to Deep Roots for the meaning of her words, and stared in silence. ‘Or, leave,’ she added. The Red-eyes around the dead faun bowed their heads and muttered, reluctantly. When Tabitha looked to Deep Roots for their meaning, he nodded solemnly. They understood.

‘Good,’ Tabitha told them, walking away. ‘You’re Sky Tribe now. You live our way. If I find you torturing anything again, you’re gone.’

Things seemed to go easier after that night, Tabitha considered. And to be fair to the Red-eyes, most of them seemed open to Deep Roots’ teachings. That the spirits of prey were better honoured in quick death and lengthier prayer, and not the other way around. Many of the tribe had seen Tabitha stun that faun too, before she’d killed it; convinced that she had some kind of magical ability.

Watching the rising sun, Tabitha looked down the mountain slope to where she’d dragged the dead pantherwolf and let it drop. Its remains were still down there; the bones scattered and picked clean.

‘Stone Shore?’ she said, turning to him as he ate by the fire. ‘Come here a sec?’ She motioned to him to join her. He sounded surprised when she pointed out the pantherwolf’s bones. He looked amazed when he asked her if she’d killed it, and she nodded in reply.

‘Can you help me bring the bones up here?’ she said, pointing to the ground at their feet. Stone Shore quickly bowed his head and walked away, yelling a group together to fetch them.

‘I was going to help!’ she called over, jogging after them as they ran down the mountain path. She felt a hand on her shoulder, stopping her. Deep Roots smiled and shook his head, and held out a palm to tell her she didn’t need to. ‘No, I’ll help them,’ she told him. He just shook his head again.

You are, queen, he signed to her, smiling. Be like a queen.

‘I never wanted to be a queen,’ she replied, shaking her head. Signing as if to push the whole thing away from her. ‘I don’t want to rule you. I just want to help.’ Deep Roots looked concerned; lost in thought. He led her to a flatter stretch of the rocky mountainside, and took a chalky stone from his belt.

‘Do you always have chalk with you?’ she asked him, pointing at the stone with a smile. The old man laughed and nodded, and started drawing. He sketched a line of figures on the rock wall; the tribe. Started tapping and doodling to explain.

You’re one of the tribe, he told her. Inside, the same spirit as everyone else. It doesn’t matter what shape you are. You’re spirit-born, like us. She’d been named, he said. She’d beaten Stone Shore in fair combat, and become alpha.

‘It wasn’t fair at all,’ Tabitha mumbled, looking at her hands. He couldn’t stun and shock like she could. Deep Roots shook his head emphatically. He drew another figure above the crowd, with a mane, much bigger than the rest. Her. He added lines coming from her hands, like magic. He closed his fist and nodded at her, that this was a good thing. Then he walked off to a far piece of rock. Drew more figures on a flat plain. He walked back to the far side of the rock face, and drew figures under a crescent moon.

‘The Bronzebacks and Red-eyes,’ Tabitha mumbled, as he walked back over. He tapped his chalk stone on the oversized figure; tapped his head. Sketched more figures in the crowd. He moved his hands like paths joining, or maybe rivers. Joining into one path; one flow. A single tribe.

‘I know, but it feels wrong to take over like this,’ Tabitha replied, trying to think how to explain it. Shrugging and shaking her head; stepping away to say she didn’t want it. Deep Roots just shook his head; said she was wrong.

Watch, he told her, walking to the nook where they kept their kindling dry for the hearthfire. Grabbing a stick as thick as his finger, he turned to her. He slapped a hand on the picture of Cave Clan on the rockface.

This stick, is one clan, he told her. He snapped it easily. Then the old man took several sticks and made a show of bunching them together, one at a time; each from far away at arm’s length. He showed her that together, they wouldn’t snap. They wouldn’t even bend, not with all his strength. He peeled a strip of soft bark from the pile, wrapped it around the sticks and knotted it off to hold them tight together.

The idea of you, he explained, tapping his head and pointing to her, is the wrapping. It keeps the clans together. One Sky Tribe. Strong wrapping, strong sticks. Be a queen.

‘Kha V’ha,’ Stone Shore said behind her, breathless, leading the pack he’d taken down the mountain. All carrying the thick pantherwolf bones. Tabitha glanced at Deep Roots quickly.

‘Good,’ she told Stone Shore, as sternly as she could. ‘Take them into the hall.’ The pack obeyed and carried them off quickly through the doorway; Tabitha followed regally at an easy pace. Deep Roots grunted and patted her on the shoulder, smiling. Approving. It didn’t feel right to have people running around for her like this. But... different world. Different time. She was alpha. Deep Roots gave her the bundle of sticks to remind her of what they’d said. He was right. If the clans needed a strong wrapping to survive these invaders, an idea to unite them for one cause, then that was what she’d be.

Barkless Tree watched Tabitha arrange the pantherwolf bones around her high seat in the hall, growing branches to hang them in a pattern. He smiled at a new thought, and ran back outside.

Tabitha couldn’t sleep that night. She’d tried her own bedded alcove; she’d tried by the fire in the main hall. Just lying there among the sleeping tribe, eyes open, watching the soft ghostly glow behind the living beams and rafters. She tossed and turned, and went to sit with Fishbowl in the garden. Paced around the clearing until the night sky was paling to dawn. The doubts crept in like shadows. What she was doing here. What she was doing to these people. Denaturing them, just like she had with Seven and Fishbowl. Just like the Watchers had denatured her. The thought bit down in a rush of guilt.

‘I’m protecting them,’ she whispered to herself, pushing the thoughts down as she went back inside. Staring into the flames; dozens of sleeping shapes all around her. For once in your life, grow some fucking conviction.

‘I’m here to help them,’ she whispered under her breath. Watching them sleep. It’s a new time for them. If they need a new leader for that time, that’s what I’ll be.

A pale shape caught her eye in the distant dark. A big white form, reflecting the glow of the flames. The pantherwolf skull, lashed up on the far wall. Below it, a seat. Her throne. The thought filled her with dread. She heard a short sharp in-breath beside the fire; someone was awake.

What are you doing? Sea Mist signed to her. Haven’t you slept?

‘...Who am I?’ Tabitha asked her uncertainly. Tapping her chest with her fingertips. Sea Mist looked confused as she got up. Coming closer though, studying Tabitha’s face in the flickering firelight, she could see the doubt in her eyes. Sea Mist grabbed her shoulders; held her gaze.

You are Dark Storm, she told her, without hesitation. You are my sister. Our queen. You fight for us. You built our new home, and joined the clans. Tabitha studied the fierceness in her eyes. There wasn’t a shred of doubt. You saved my life, Sea Mist signed. It’s yours. Sunlight crept across the floor as a figure pulled the door aside. Barkless Tree. The tribe were waking in the dawn glow as he carried something into the hall. A pair of deer antlers, twined to a wreath of bone; tarred black with pitch. A crown. Hesitating, Tabitha took hold of it. Studied it.

‘Thank you,’ she said uncertainly, holding it up to the light. ‘But I don’t think I could–

‘Kha-V’ha,’ Stone Shore interrupted behind her, getting to his feet. Watching the Sky Queen’s silhouette in the dawn light. Her great bird-spirit, perched on the peak beyond. Stone Shore bellowed at the rest to wake up; to witness. Tabitha stood there awkwardly, holding the makeshift crown. Barkless backed away before she could hand it back. Sea Mist and Deep Roots watched and smiled. Everyone in the tribe was waking and watching; the only sound was the crackle of flames. Tabitha stared, terrified. She’d never made a real decision in her life. She’d always just gone with the flow. No more. Tabitha turned the crown in her hands; its bony weight clacked on her hard fingers in the dawn light. No more running, she told herself, lifting the crown. I’ve found my tribe. They were here by choice; they followed her by choice. Now she had to lead them. Fight for them. When she set the crown on her head the hall erupted in glad howls and yells. One Sky Tribe, vast and united, raising their knives for the queen.

‘Bring back as many as you can find,’ she told Barkless Tree later that morning, showing him the vampire flowers in Fishbowl’s garden. ‘Take a Red-eye and a Bronzeback with you. Get them talking.’ Barkless smiled his obedience. Nodded approvingly at her crown as he left. Grinning in reply, Tabitha turned back to the mountain clearing and scratched her head. She tried to imagine how the new wall would look here. A curtain wall to protect them, grown from those plants like the hall. If it was just the tribe on this world, she’d have second thoughts about introducing the idea of a castle. But it wasn’t just the tribe. And they’d need all the help they could get against those invaders. I’d build an entire city if it kept these people safe, she told herself. I’m not going against evolution. This is evolution.

‘Bloody hell,’ she muttered, scratching her head harder. She couldn’t stop itching today. ‘Sea Mist?’ the woman looked up from her arrow-making by the fire. ‘Come here a sec,’ she said, as she waved her on to follow. ‘And there’s no need to look so bloody respectful, you know,’ she said with a smile. ‘You’re still my friend.’

‘I can’t stop scratching,’ Tabitha told her, as they stood on the precipice together. Signing to Sea Mist to explain what she meant. Sea Mist grunted to her to sit cross-legged, and sat down behind her. Started picking through her hair.

‘It’s lice, isn’t it?’ said Tabitha. They sat in silence; Sea Mist rifling through her hair and plucking efficiently now and then.

‘I feel like a monkey,’ Tabitha chuckled quietly, enjoying the strange sensation of being groomed.

‘Hm?’ Sea Mist grunted.

‘Oh, never mind,’ Tabitha said over her shoulder. ‘It’s an Earth animal. Looks a bit like me.’ She couldn’t believe she’d been missing out on the joys of a good grooming. She glanced at Sea Mist’s rough hand then, as it appeared beside her. Something louse-like wriggled in her pinched fingers. It wasn’t small.

‘What the faaa...?’ Tabitha mumbled, staring in horror at the fierce ancient bug. Bigger than a woodlouse; armoured in spiral scales. When Sea Mist’s hand disappeared behind her again, Tabitha heard meaty crunches. ‘Ok, you didn’t just eat that, did you?’ she mumbled in disgust, still looking ahead where she sat. ‘...Dude.’

Her arse was numb. How long had they been sitting here now? Sea Mist was still working her way through her long hair; still plucking out things to eat. Still crunching and chewing where she sat behind her.

‘I’m starting to think you’re just using me for my tasty lice,’ Tabitha mumbled, smiling as she watched the clouds drift by. Wait... there was something reflecting the sunlight down there. Something big; she could just about see it from here, and it was miles away. Is that... them?

‘Thanks buddy,’ she told Sea Mist, getting up in a sudden hurry. ‘Over there, do you see that?’ She pointed to the shining speck on the horizon when she saw Sea Mist’s confusion. Sea Mist’s gentle face broke into a snarling stare when she caught sight of it. Nothing reflected the sun like that. It could only be the demons.

‘I’m going down there,’ said Tabitha, turning to the peak to whistle Seven down.

I’m going with you, Sea Mist signed.

‘No,’ Tabitha replied, shaking her head. ‘It’s too dangerous. If I don’t come back, I want you to lead the tribe. Ok?’

No, Sea Mist replied defiantly. I’m going with you.

‘Hey, obey your queen,’ Tabitha joked, putting the crown back on and pointing to it. ‘Stay here. ...And trust me,’ she said, holding Sea Mist’s shoulder. Smiling to her. Sea Mist stared into her eyes, and nodded reluctantly. Seven landed heavily in a rush of wind beside them, shaking the ground beneath their feet.

‘I’ll make them leave,’ Tabitha called to Sea Mist, leaving the crown as she climbed Seven’s wing and took the saddle. ‘Or they can burn.’ Sea Mist watched as she turned Seven and leapt him off the precipice; the tribe chattering and pointing at the queen’s shrinking shape. Staring as the great black war-spirit tore off into the sky like thunder, roaring its ghostly flames.

34

The tiny clatter of rushed typing filled a military field tent. A glowing screen sprouted alien words, racing across the blank report.

PROGRESS SUMMARY: MULTI-SITE GOLD EXTRACTION CONTINUES AT STRONG PACE. QUOTA FULFILMENT AT 42%.

AS PREVIOUSLY REPORTED, ORE EXTRACTOR 6 DESTROYED BY UNIDENTIFIED ASSAILANT/WILDLIFE, BELIEVED TO BE LARGE AIRBORNE REPTILE. SUPPORT TEAM KILLED/MISSING IN ACTION FOLLOWING ENGAGEMENT WITH AGGRESSIVE INDIGENOUS; PRESUMED DEAD. AS NOTED, DROPSHIP FAILED TO EXTRACT SUPPORT TEAM DUE TO MERCENARY PILOT ERROR. SUBSTANCE ABUSE INDICATED.

MERCENARY CONTRACTORS ASSIGNED BY MANAGEMENT LACK FORMAL TRAINING AND CONTINUE TO OBSTRUCT OPERATIONS AT MULTIPLE ORE EXTRACTION SITES. INCREASED MANPOWER APPRECIATED, BUT STRONGLY RECOMMEND REMOVAL OF ALL MERCENARY PERSONNEL FROM CAMPAIGN AS LIABILITIES.

Captain Atha sighed and sat back from his terminal, with an armoured clank on the creaking metal chair. He was running the mining campaign from a hi-tech habitat tent, down in the new peat-stinking field base on the planet’s surface. There was a new push to reclaim the northern gold seams from the natives; they needed a real base on the planet to work from. If this place could be called a base, anyway.

At least it stops us going stir crazy in orbit. The terminal screen lit Atha’s dust-blue face; lined and fresh-stubbled, and broken-nosed since his youth. His skin still tanned and sea-blasted from their last campaign. His pale combat armour was scratched and dented all over; its previous paint job had weathered away to bare shining metal at the edges. Its fabric inners already stank of damp and BO. The cold wet climate here hated his laser rifle too. That metal was alloyed to be rustproof, he’d been told, once upon a time. But after years of sea air, and now wintry marsh, that didn’t seem to hold true. A few white-hot laserbolts would dry the wet barrel right out to steam, if he ever got the chance to fire it again. Not much chance of that in his new employment.

Fuck, he hated report writing. Especially reporting the deaths of close friends. Except... they weren’t friends, as far as his new employers were concerned. Not any more. They were associate independent contractors. Fancy name for crooked cops and hired guns. But with the life-changing fortune that’d just been credited to every bank account in his battalion, and even more in his own... well, things were a little greyer than they used to be.

He served in the Ministry Guardians, after all. He’d already lost friends in active duty. It was tragic... and part of the job. Except now he was losing good soldiers needlessly, thanks to these clueless mercenaries tacked on with them, and their fucking drugs... and he couldn’t work without them, because his bosses wanted their gold mined faster.

Keep it together, or they’ll replace you, he told himself. Just a few more weeks. He could already hear his new mansion calling to him on Serenity; all that money too. One hell of a step up from his mouldy apartment in the projects, out on Planet Ass End of Nowhere... and his shitty Guardians pay. I’m building a better life for my kids, and that’s it, he told himself. And all the kids and grandkids they’ll have too, with all their inheritance, and their beautiful lives in the capital... and they won’t even remember me. Good. I was just Evil Great Grandpa from the colonies, who took crooked money and robbed a world. And I did it all for them.

Just a few more weeks, that was all. All he had to do was grab The Four’s gold quota from this cold miserable planet, and scare away the natives until the development teams got here to civilise them. Just a few weeks’ work, before the real terraforming crews got here. He didn’t care what they had planned for this planet. He cared about early retirement, and actually getting to see his kids grow up. He cared about not getting shot any more, by addicts and smugglers and thieves. He cared about the new millions in his bank account, and getting them invested for his family, before those millions might disappear again if his bosses got caught.

Wrong? Of course it’s wrong. By good old Guardian standards, anyway. As if there was a good old Guardians any more. What they didn’t tell him in training was this: You’re going to be assigned to the toughest frontier of space you can imagine. Out there, Guardian ships disappear. Gangs will try to kill you and take your ship. Any ranks you climb, you’ll climb out there. No, your posting still isn’t negotiable Captain, so stop asking. Now take your shitty salary and risk your life for the federated worlds. Turned out that honour and duty didn’t pay. Not out here. Damn right he was taking the crooked money.

Sighing, exhausted, Atha rubbed his aching eyes and tapped away again at the report on his terminal. Cursed and deleted his words. There weren’t any decent communication networks out here; not like he was used to. With the distance involved, messages could take a couple of days to relay back to Ministry homespace. But his reports were time-stamped, of course. His powerful new employers would know if there was a delay. They didn’t like delays, or the people who caused them. Better to be someone they liked.

Sipping his stim drink, Atha glanced around at a bright-skinned junior officer walking into the field tent. She smiled politely and sat quietly at a desk in the corner. She was sharply turned out, and remarkably clean for someone camping in a muddy plain; she brought with her a faint smell of soap. Some people just had that special ability, he’d found, to stay clean on campaign. He never could figure out where they found so much soap. Or why they bothered. Staring at his report on the screen, he heard her sigh as she set about her own report for the day.

Well, at least I’m not suffering alone. We all hate it. We all have to do it. May as well get it over with. Steeling himself for the task, Atha hunched back over his terminal to finish his report.

URGENTLY REQUEST PERMISSION TO STAND DOWN MERCENARY OPERATIVES, TO ENSURE ZERO LOSS OF LIFE AND EFFECTIVE CONTINUOSITY OF LOW-PROFILE CAMPAIGN.

‘Continuosity?’ Atha asked himself quietly, gravel-voiced, mulling the word over. ‘...Continution?’ That wasn’t right.

‘Continuation, Captain?’ the junior officer chipped in pleasantly, overhearing his mutters. Tapping away at her terminal in the corner.

‘Hm. Thank you,’ Atha replied, correcting his report. Smart-arse.

‘...Captain?’ the junior officer piped up later, when Atha took a weary pause from his paperwork.

‘Hm,’ he grunted, distracted, sipping his stim drink. Studying endless analytics on the screen.

‘...Some of us were wondering Captain, but no one ever tells us... With respect, sir, why do they call you the Bastard of Greysea?’

‘Get out,’ Atha snarled suddenly. Staring at her, silent and furious.

‘M-my report, Captain,’ she stuttered nervously, glancing at her terminal.

‘Get out!’ Atha bellowed, slamming a fist on his desk. Suddenly seething. Terrified, the junior officer scurried from the tent as fast as she could.

‘Captain!’ said a green-finned soldier, running into the tent in panic. ‘Captain, outside!’

‘What!?’ Atha snapped angrily, hitting the key to close his reports. Taking his rifle from the table with a heavy clunk.

‘It’s, er... well sir, we don’t know what it is,’ the soldier stuttered.

‘Sir, what the hell is that thing?’ another soldier asked the captain, as he stepped outside into the cold marshy air. Following the troops’ pointing fingers to a small dark shape flying out from the distant mountains.

‘That would be a bird,’ the captain replied sarcastically, barely interested, turning back for the field tent. ‘Don’t waste my time again, Private.’

‘It looks like it’s coming right for us, sir,’ said another soldier, studying it through whirring binoculars.

‘All the Guardians in federated space and I had to get stuck with the bloody rookies,’ the captain grumbled, picking a piece of breakfast from his teeth. Actually, that thing does look pretty fucking big. Bird or not, I’m not taking any chances. ‘Alright, light it up,’ he sighed. With a wave of his hand the giant battletank on legs behind them droned into life. Turned its turret with a heavy metal hum, and trained a pair of gigantic cannons on the dark growing shape in the sky.

‘Hold your fire!’ came a high shrill voice. A scrawny scaled creature came running from its habitat tent, fish eyes wide in terror. ‘Wait, for gods’ sake! You’ll create another incident!’

‘An incident?’ the captain replied. ‘Since when is wildlife management considered an incident?’ He watched the thing soaring closer in the sky. It was a big bastard, no doubt about that. If it had any sense it’d take a look and keep flying overhead. Unless... reports of a large airborne reptile... It couldn’t be that?

‘Sir, it’s dropping. Fast,’ said one of the soldiers, watching in dread.

‘Think about the repercussions!’ the scaled creature urged them.

‘I can see some repercussions right now if we don’t persuade that thing away from us,’ the captain replied. ‘Tank One, warning shot!’ he barked.

‘Yes sir,’ A voice fuzzed over his wristcom, as the fifty-foot brute behind them clanked and raised its main guns.

‘Wait!’ the fish-eyed creature yelled desperately. ‘There’s someone riding it!’

‘What?’ the captain replied, grabbing binoculars from the soldier beside him. ‘Tank One, stand down!’

Tabitha watched the staring mercenaries carefully as Seven circled their base. There was someone waving; someone else shouting through a PA system. She recognised the words from the software she’d been studying on her wristcom. That was Trade Language. They wanted to talk.

The fish-eyed man smiled to Tabitha as she landed Seven down, and walked him across the field. He and the troops behind him grew more and more uncomfortable as the huge monster came closer.

‘I’m so glad that you’re prepared to speak with us, both myself and the Captain,’ the fish-eyed man called to her pleasantly. ‘From one independent prospector to another, clearly... this could be the start of a wonderful partnership.’ The red-haired alien just walked the monster closer; the scaled man was growing nervous. He checked quickly over his shoulder for the reassuring presence of armed soldiers, and the walking battletank whirring into life. Training its guns on the creature as it came closer.

Tabitha studied her wristcom. The software was translating the strange man’s words in her earpiece. She recognised many of the words, but there were still holes in what she’d heard. His words translated into English rapidly in her earpiece. She got the gist.

‘Leave, or die,’ Tabitha replied simply, stony-faced, in what little Trade Language she could speak. She’d repeated it over and over during the flight. It was all she’d wanted to tell them. The scaled man looked nervous. The surprised soldiers behind him glanced at one another.

‘Am I to understand then that the local population are... friends of yours?’ he tried.

‘That’s right,’ Tabitha replied, seething, as the software translated his words.

‘Ah,’ he said awkwardly. ‘In which case, I fully appreciate that this meeting takes place under... extremely tragic circumstances,’ the scaled man said sympathetically, with a fake pained expression. ‘Please be assured, that you have our unreserved apologies and condolences, for our previous... misunderstandings,’ he tried, with a tragic tone.

‘Misunderstandings!?’ Tabitha snapped furiously.

‘B-but perhaps if we could just... discuss things further?’ he continued nervously. ‘Come to a reasonable compromise? I think that we both stand to benefit considerably from this meeting. And especially your... people.’ Tabitha’s translation software gave her a basic version of what he was saying.

‘You’re stealing this world from its people!’ Tabitha yelled furiously, in Trade Language, just like she’d practised. ‘There’s nothing to discuss! Leave, or die!’ She aimed Seven’s huge head at him like a colossal cannon. She didn’t care what else he was saying. Didn’t pay attention to the translation; she didn’t want to hear it. The terrified man watched a white light begin to glow and burn in the monster’s black throat.

‘But we can unlock the wealth of this world, for your people!’ said the scaled man. ‘We could work together!’ He watched Tabitha as she looked over to an unmanned watchtower on the edge of their camp. The black monster she rode turned its head to follow her gaze. Roared a thundering burst of white fire that blew the watchtower apart. The troops were yelling in sudden terror, taking cover and opening fire, as the scaled official ran for the safety of the tents. A tall blue-skinned man, scarred and grizzled and clearly in command, came storming out of the camp and shot her in the shoulder. Tabitha yelled in agony and turned Seven aside for cover.

‘Leave!’ she roared wildly, watching them through the crackling flames. Before the hulking tank could turn its turrets on her Tabitha nudged Seven into the sky, and raced off for the distant mountains. Seven roared and dodged twin laserbolts from the distant tank as they tore past into the blue. Glancing back, three small gunships were lifting off from the camp; engines flaring brightly as they followed behind.

The first gunship rattled lasershots into Seven’s side and buzzed past Tabitha recklessly in the saddle; it narrowly missed Seven’s scorching breath as it shot past. A sudden blast on Seven’s back broke straps on the saddle harness – Tabitha felt it come loose. Seven spun and snatched the gunship out of the sky; Tabitha slipped free and fell screaming as he grappled it. Arms flailing desperately for anything to grab onto, she clawed hold of the gunship’s side as it dropped dead from Seven’s grip.

‘Seven!’ she screamed in panic, as she fell away beneath him on the ruined gunship. Seven saw her and dived after her; another shot exploded against him and drove him aside snarling.

Dropping in terrified freefall, gasping for breath as the rushing air thundered in her ears, Tabitha watched Seven struggle and shrink above her as he fought off the gunships. He was diving for her, where she clutched the falling wreck. But their deafening shots blew him aside in violent snarling twists. He’d never reach her in time.

Get inside this thing or die. Teeth clenched, Tabitha punched her way through the falling gunship’s glass canopy and stunned the panicked pilot as he tried to eject. The smoking wreck was dropping like a stone. She wrestled the pilot’s limp body aside and gripped the control stick; an awkward crush in the cramped cockpit. Tried and failed to right it. She slammed her palm on the canopy over her head as Seven shrank to a dot high above her; he turned another gunship into a white fireball as he dived for her again. But he’d never reach her before she hit the ground. Tabitha punched every control she could see in a desperate wind-rushing panic.

‘Where’s the fucking ejector!?’ she screamed in terror, frantically lodging herself behind the unconscious pilot in his harness. Teeth clenched, yelling curses. Smashing dents in every button and handle that might blow them clear of the wreck on a parachute. Automatically the smoking gunship opened every flap and fin to slow its fall; easing its angle over the racing forest below. Tabitha watched in dread as it ploughed down through thick bamboo.

‘Shit!’ she yelped, forcing herself in tight behind the harnessed pilot. Branches punched and rattled on the glass outside and snapped away in splintered bursts. Gripped with panic, cramming herself behind the pilot, Tabitha braced for the crash. Hands clutching her lowered head as the gunship tore through trees, and jerked and banged and smashed deafening into bare soil. A sudden fierce whiplash jolt and a lurch in her stomach; she screamed in terror as the thing flipped and crashed down hard into bamboo and glass boulders. Crushed behind the pilot in shrill agony when the thing finally crunched to a stop.

Screaming and bloody, ribs broken, Tabitha scrambled from the burning wreck. Kicked out wildly from the shattered canopy, and pulled herself free in maddening pain. She snarled and yelled, heaving the pilot out behind her to pull him free; crawling in the dirt as her broken ribs repaired. Breathing hard, she dragged him away and propped herself up against a distant rock. Yelling in pain as her bones knitted and healed, she looked away from the burning wreck for a flaming explosion that never came. Sat snarling as she healed, her eyes squeezed shut. Waiting for her streaming blood to stop, she looked the pilot over. He was dead. She cursed, and cursed again when she couldn’t find a gun. Watching the skies, she dragged herself to her feet and staggered off, and just hoped that Seven would find her.

Limping back through the forest toward the mountain, with nothing but her own ragged breath for company, Tabitha stopped for a second by a tall tree. Tried to get her breath back. She closed her eyes, breathing deep. The mothbirds sang like spirits. Bamboo leaves rustled like paper feathers in the chilly wind. Swaying branches shuttered the sunlight as she raised her closed eyes to the sky; the daylight glow flickered off and on through her eyelids like a lightswitch. A shrieking bang cut the silence like skin and threw her back screaming. A flesh-crackling burn in her chest; she was gasping in fierce scorching pain. Her eyes darted around at the forest in wild panic. More shrieking shots; laserbolts bit the ground sizzling around her. Clutching the burning hole in her chest, Tabitha scrambled away frantically and dived into the bushes as the shots whipped and hummed around her. Reeling from the scorching wound, clamping her palm against the gushing blood, she shuffled gasping into cover. Yellow eyes peering through the leaves; watching for any sign of what was out there. She heard a soft dry crunch off to her left, among the endless bamboo. A slow careful footstep. She saw nothing. Her shooter was stalking her, hidden out there in the trees. Tabitha quickly pressed her silver-bloody palm against a pine trunk beside her. Pushed her foot hard into the soil, and crept away in the other direction. Watching from the bushes. Waiting for it.

It took a few minutes, but the snail-slow footfalls grew closer. Soft steps on the dry dead leaves. Tabitha didn’t dare breathe too loudly; didn’t dare move. She watched something grow slowly from the side of a tree then, out a few yards in front of her. A thin brown tube. A gun barrel. Slow as death, the rest of the gun followed after it. A hooded soldier in a striped gold cloak; patterned head to toe like bamboo. Camouflaged perfectly, but for its slow creeping movements. As the figure glanced slowly around, it saw her silver bloody handprint on the tree trunk beside it. It instantly aimed the rifle off to the left, marking the hard footprint she’d planted there in the soil. One creeping silent footstep at a time, it stalked away from the bushes where she was hiding. Tabitha watched the figure in frozen silence, cat-still. Gold eyes staring wide, until the stalking hunter disappeared between the crowded trees. Waiting.

Hidden in the forest, the sniper scanned the ground carefully through his masked helmet. Peering from his hooded cloak to scrutinise every square inch. Any frayed fallen leaf; any drop of strange silver blood. Standing stock-still when the wind stopped blowing, and edging on in his slow shaking creep when a fresh gust moved the bamboo around him. He waited until the minutes felt like hours. He froze up at every distant call and chirp; only planted a fresh footstep when it was masked by the rustling trees up above. Breathing soft and silent; watching the woods. Gulping soundlessly; raw nerves in the thick cold silence. She wasn’t here. The alien wasn’t here. He’d taken a killshot; he knew he had. He’d been hunting and sniping since he was a kid; he’d perfected his one-shot kill until raw recruits thought he was just a myth. He didn’t miss; he never missed – how the hell had she crawled away from that shot!? Where was the blood trail!? Standing there like a statue, hidden away against the trees, he gulped nervously. Licked dry lips and grounded himself. He listened to every tiny sound out there. Strained his eyes on every fallen leaf; every rustling branch in the undergrowth. Then he saw it. A holy revelation in the distant trees. Felt sudden relief rush through him. It was that same bright red hair, hidden in shadow but stark as a road sign. Mottled and shrouded behind thick dark shrubs, almost impossible to see. He shrank back behind the tree beside him and slowly raised his rifle. Settled into his stance. He gave the forest around him a slow careful glance for anything else that might be out there. Breathing deep and silent, he shouldered the rifle stock. Raised the scope to his eye. Trained the glowing crosshairs right in the shadowy centre of those distant red curls. He held his breath until his shaking sights settled still; curled his finger tighter round the trigger. Fired. But that red hair didn’t fall down like it should have. The shot should’ve dropped her dead behind those bushes, and those red curls should’ve disappeared, and they didn’t. Panicking, the sniper snapped his rifle up and fired again. And again. The red curls were scorched to shreds, but still they just dangled there as they burned. Unless... Fuck.

Cold golden eyes crept on silently behind him, bobbing and staring in silent hate. Tabitha pushed her hair back behind her ear, covering the new bald spot she’d made with her knife. By the time the frantic figure looked back she was on him. Tackled him to the dirt and ripped his hood down to smash her fist into that struggling mask, over and over, until it was a crumpled screaming mess beneath her. Snarling, struggling, Tabitha sprang her claws and tore his gloved hands until she could prise the rifle from his grip and beat him to death with it. She didn’t stop swinging until the gargled screaming stopped. Until there was no chance in hell that creeping fucker was getting back up to kill her. By the time she stopped and dropped the bloody rifle he was nothing but gore in the dead leaves. Staring wild at the forest around her, catching her breath until her core stopped pounding, Tabitha wiped the blood splatter off her grimy face. Turned the body over and wrestled the hooded cloak off him, and dragged it in the mud to hide the blood on the fabric.

‘Fuck,’ she growled, studying the rifle. She’d destroyed it; it wouldn’t even hold together as a club. Clawing around on his belt though, she found his sidearm. Cocked the strange laser pistol, tried the sights on a distant tree, and shoved it in her new holster belt. She drained his water canteen in big parched gulps, checked around to make sure nothing else was hunting her, and walked away into the forest.

I warned you, she thought in the silence, wrapping the cloak around her shoulders as she disappeared between the trees. I’m coming for you. All of you.

Tabitha wandered back towards the distant edge of the forest as Seven soared high overhead, searching for her. She just had to get out from the trees so he could see her. Between her and the moors beyond the forest though, a pair of soldiers were stalking through the trees. Probably looking for the downed pilot.

Hiding down in the bushes as they passed by, Tabitha doubled back and followed them until they split up. She crept up behind one of them silently; a scaly-skinned woman. Pulled the glass knife silently from her belt. So easy, just to reach out and slit her throat... and she would, if the woman tried to kill her. Tabitha grabbed her arm and stunned her in a volt-crackling grip. The woman went stiff as a board and dropped straight back in her arms. Tabitha dragged her away and took whatever she could. Water. Pistol. Rifle. Knife. Some kind of futuristic binoculars. These soldiers were loaded. Taking off the woman’s wristcom, Tabitha opened a note on it and quickly tapped a message in what characters she knew. Left the wristcom propped up on the woman’s stomach, and ran.

Hidden away, Tabitha looked up at the sound of distant footsteps. She heard an alien voice on the unconscious woman’s wristcom. Heard the other soldier coming back to look for her. Tabitha scrambled away quietly and watched from the trees as the soldier reappeared and came running over in shock, trying to wake the woman up. He studied the message left on her wristcom, in broken Trade Language:

LEAVE OR DIE

The soldier jumped to his feet in sudden panic and opened fire on the trees around him. Tabitha cursed and clamped her hand to the fresh smoking hole in her shoulder as the blood streamed down.

‘You’re just getting it, are you?’ she mumbled, flicking out her crackling claws. Before the panicked soldier could turn back at the sound, Tabitha pounced and stunned him in the dirt.

‘Seven!’ Tabitha yelled, as she ran from the trees onto the plains. He swept overhead in an ear-popping rush and landed down with a thump. Teeth bared. White eyes burning as he watched her run up his wing to the saddle.

‘Back to the base!’ she yelled, launching him into the air as the healed harness grew around her. Thundering up into the sky until the invaders’ camp was a tiny cluster below them. Tabitha pulled her melding hood into a helmet in the deafening wind. Gripped the saddle scale and dropped Seven in a snarling dive, fire-throated and raw.

‘Burn it!’ she screamed at him, hurtling for the frantic base.

‘Fire!’ Captain Atha roared below. The base trained their weapons on the growing dot above and erupted in a flashing chaos of laserfire. The walking tank thumped artillery, an endless ground-trembling roar, lighting up the dull winter world. The black monster shot down suddenly, roaring white fire; its flaring jetscales tore up the tundra in its wake. Its dark rider screaming like something possessed, launching the monster at them like a flaming torpedo. Seven shot past and punched his body clean through the tallest building, toppling it in a sudden landslide. He spun his weight on giant wings; dropped on the walking tank like a shadow and tried to tear it apart. Lasershots scorched his scales; he threw up a wing to shield Tabitha. Snapped his head around at the firing troops and turned them to screaming ash in a pale inferno. The survivors were running; yelling in terror. As the monster leapt and crashed down in the camp its rider was screaming bloody murder. She snapped up her laser pistol and shot; the bolt threw a running soldier back in his tracks with a crackling thump of light and smoke. Tabitha trained the sights on another and shot her down before she could fire. Saw that bastard captain taking pot shots again and fired right back, forcing his retreat.

‘Seven! There!’ Tabitha snarled. Her monster took a breath as he turned. Belched a pillar of flaming light through the empty camp, torching a great crackling trench through the ground. Burning everything in his path. Plastic tent-huts fell to windblown ash. Crates blew like bombs. The captain ran for his life. The survivors could only look back in terror, running from the carnage. Staring at that deathly living machine in silent horror, whatever the hell it was, as it clawed the abandoned huts apart in a frenzy and sent another scorching napalm trench through the empty camp.

‘Retreat! Fucking retreat!’ Captain Atha yelled at his troops, dragging a frozen officer away by the collar. ‘Get to the dropships!’ He looked back at the camp, lost in pale raging flames behind him. Their rifle shots thumped and fizzled on the creature’s scales uselessly as it stomped towards them. Some dark primal machine in the flames, growling low and savage; a star-eyed monster wreathed in churning smoke. Lit death-black in white fire, like it’d crawled from hell. And there between its shoulders... her.

‘I said fucking retreat!’ Atha yelled at a pair of troops trying to cover him. ‘Atha to orbit!’ the captain roared into his wristcom. ‘We need those dropships now!’ The monster roared them off the base and tore the last building apart in a crash of sparking rubble. ‘Someone put a flare up for the bloody dropships!’ the captain yelled out, as his soldiers escaped onto the plains. That strange black rider peeled her helmet off, stopping her monster’s rampage to watch them run. She met Atha’s stare from the raging fires; red hair tossed in the ash-blowing wind.

Last chance, thought Tabitha, her eyes reflecting the flames. Do not fuck with us.

35

Tabitha and Seven shot back for Sacred Mountain. Smoke was rising from Havenhall. Her stomach lurched when she saw twin gunships circling their home; blasting its grown pillars to splinters. Her tribe, her family, yelling and screaming where they sheltered inside. Firing arrows on the gunships from the doorway; clattering and futile. Seven felt all of Tabitha’s fierce sudden rage inside him, and dropped to tear a gunship to flaming scrap. He spun and snarled as lasershots pummelled his scales. Tabitha wanted to rip off the harness and drop on the second gunship herself, she was so furious. Seven tore it from the sky to crash and burn in a fireball down the mountainside.

‘Oh god, no,’ Tabitha muttered, as she landed Seven with a thump and hurried down his wing. The clearing was dotted with a dozen bodies, fallen defending their home. Right there was Raging Flame from the Cave Clan; dead. Away behind lay Bronzebacks and Red-eyes by the garden. Lifeless bodies, still smoking from laserfire. Over there were Nightsong and Great River, midnight black and golden white; tribes apart and deep in love. Making a home here, and robbed of it. Great River sat and held his thin graceful mate, staring in shock at her body; unmoving. Tabitha watched in tears. Great River was looking at her now, and shaking his head. She didn’t understand his words, but she knew what he was saying. What he was shouting at her.

Stop crying. Stop being weak. You’re our queen. Tabitha sniffled and nodded, and buried the heartache deep down. She had to be their strength. She gulped back the sadness and wiped her tears, and met Great River’s silent stare for a moment. He nodded over at Havenhall. Tabitha turned to see the tribe edging outside. Watching their shocked heartbroken faces, as they took in the smoking scene.

The tribe didn’t see their Sky Queen cry. They saw the vengeance in her, and the fury. The distant rising specks on the horizon must have been the invaders’ dropships. Reinforcements. Tabitha watched and felt her jaw tightening; her fists clenched and sparking. A fierce hate filled her, black and wild and burning.

Enough. If they want war, they’ll get it.

‘They’ll be back,’ she told Deep Roots and Sea Mist, as they rushed to see her. ‘Come on.’

As the tribe followed her into the clearing, there was a stark sudden wailing behind her. Tabitha felt her throat tighten at the sound. She looked away to hide her heartbreak when White Cloud fell down by Raging Flame’s body, howling broken-voiced like a banshee. Distraught in her grief and screaming at the sky. Friends and families rushed to the bodies, crying and shouting, or beating their chests in a snarling rage. Roaring deep raw curses at the world. The dark Red-eyes crowded around Nightsong’s body with Great River and grew rabid at the sight. Howling and pulling their knives. Yelling fierce vendettas to flay her killers alive.

Tabitha stared at the scene, burning up inside. All this pain and heartbreak those invaders had brought here, and for what?

Just like the Watchers, she thought. No more. Tabitha looked around her, and thought of home. The castle, and her friends, and why they’d fought. This was it. This was what a Ghost was for. Hands crackling with voltage, Tabitha pulled her knife and raised it to the sky. She watched the broken crowd turning to her. For a few moments, there was nothing but silence in the cold wind. Hundreds of eyes, staring. Then... a growl. A single, spine-tingling canine snarl. Another joined it, and a dozen more. Hundreds of them. Tabitha could feel their rage swelling like a tide in her chest.

There’s no honour in being outgunned, she told herself angrily. She’d been with the Ghosts; she could teach the tribe to fight a more modern war. She’d have to, if these people had any hope of survival. She’d known enough in her old life to have a few ideas; so what if they were all from films. It was her duty to share the new thoughts: about sieges and hit-and-runs, and guerrilla war. Tabitha walked out into the clearing, sprang her claws and broke up the cold hard ground. She dug a pit as the tribe gathered to watch in seething silence. Grabbing some bamboo trunks, she cut them into spiked stakes and stood them up solid in the pit to demonstrate. She covered them over with branches and dead leaves to hide the trap, and watched the tribe for their reactions. Maybe they knew the technique already; maybe not. Barkless Tree was nodding. She knew he’d take to it.

‘Alright. Barkless, take twenty people into the forest, and dig pits like this,’ she said, signing to make herself clear, as she dismantled the trap. ‘But off the hunting trails. Mark them with the Sacred Mountain sign, so we’ll see them.’ Barkless took her meaning, and wasted no time in leading a group down the mountain path.

Tabitha showed the tribe every idea she could think of, just in case any were useful to them. She mentioned how she’d worn bamboo halves for arm and leg guards, back on the lakeshore; and how a simple glass shield or a wooden chestplate under their furs might save their life. How pine-tarred tinder might make a flaming arrow, though they’d have to test it out. How the armour-piercing arrowheads she remembered from a TV history lesson used a narrow bodkin spike. Hopefully these random thoughts were more useful to the tribe than they were to her, since they could actually shoot.

She explained how wearing mud and leaves could camouflage them against the invaders, and give them the element of surprise. Or even just throwing something to distract the soldiers with a distant noise, or blinding them with paint or mud, like she had with that hulking monster back on Earth. She had to convince them that these invaders were people, not demons, and that they could be killed. But most important of all was to get their hands on whatever tools and weapons these mercenaries had – anything that might give them an edge. Or just anything they could do to spook and terrify these invaders, and break their morale. Maybe the tribe knew all this already; maybe they had no use for these thoughts. All she could do was share the ideas, in case it kept them alive.

‘Sea Mist, I need all the moonflowers we have,’ Tabitha told her later, clawing a map in the packed soil. ‘Take ten people, and plant the flowers in a ring around Havenhall, like this. I’m going to grow a wall around us.’ The woman nodded and obeyed, and barked orders at the rest. ‘Roots, take care of the people,’ Tabitha asked the old man. ‘Bury our dead.’ Still wiping tears from his bloodshot eyes, her old retainer nodded solemnly and walked off; leading the tribe to carry their fallen and take up the deadsong. His long ancient howl cut Tabitha to the bone. When the whole tribe joined their grieving voices to his, she had to gulp back her heartache before the tears came again.

‘Stone Shore, Swift Blood. You’ll lead the fight,’ Tabitha told them, taking them aside to stand by the precipice. ‘Cold Moon, you too,’ she said, motioning to the Red-eyes’ alpha to join them. Sitting down together, and working out what Tabitha was asking, they watched the Bronzeback leader sketch a simple fight scene on the flat rock. Skinny hunters with flying spears, running at the demons en masse. A sudden great charge across the plains; overwhelming the invaders with sheer numbers in glorious open battle. But Stone Shore insisted on another approach first, to thin their numbers, and sketched out the trees and hills. It was better to fight them on the land they knew, deep in the forest, where they had the advantage. Tripping roots and sudden drops. The demons were slow and heavily dressed; the clans hunted quick and quiet among the trees. Cold Moon took the chalk and sketched a crescent moon over the scene, and the stars in the sky. The invaders were day-fighters, she explained. Sky Tribe should hunt in the dark.

‘Good,’ Tabitha replied, meeting their stares. ‘And take their rifles, too,’ she added, sketching one in the dirt. Making sure they understood. They weren’t going to live as they always had, once those guns were in their hands. But if they were to go on living at all, they didn’t have much choice.

They spoke for a while longer about the best routes to take in the forest. The places to draw the invaders in, then lose them and single them out. Tabitha helped them to draw up a rough map of the land; chalking out the best paths and killing spots with their gruff words and pointing fingers.

‘Alright, it’s a plan,’ said Tabitha, nodding to her generals as they stood up with her. Trying to hide how nervous she felt. ‘I need to build this wall around us now, before it gets dark,’ she explained, pointing to Sea Mist where she’d planted moonflowers around the hall. ‘I need you three to gather up every fighter we have. Explain this to them,’ she said, pointing to their sketches and the map. ‘We’re hunting tonight.’

Silent as spirits, the Sky Tribe left the foothills that night, sprinting out into the black forest under a cold full moon. Staring eyes and mud-darkened fur; hundreds of silhouettes running through the rustling grass. A sudden booming flash lit the mountain summit behind them; Seven thundered an echoing roar and tore a diving gunship to wreckage. The war had begun.

‘Spread out. Hunt,’ Tabitha whispered to the tribe around her, in broken Stormish. ‘We’ll meet at the forest edge.’ The snarling Red-eyes took off into the pitch-black forest, as if they could see it all as clear as day. The Bronzebacks lowered their spears and peeled off for flatter moonlit ground, racing away into the night. Cave Clan splintered and hurtled off down familiar hunting paths. Sea Mist slung her bow, gave Tabitha a parting nod, and vanished into the trees.

Suddenly alone, Tabitha sprang out her claws to test her crackling sparks. She looked up at a second thundering fireball over Havenhall, the cubs and elders guarded inside, as Seven tore another gunship down. Lighting up the darkness like a giant white flare. Tabitha tightened her glass knife and the pistol in her belt, and sprinted off into the night.

36

An alien creature blinked its gold eyes in the moonlit water, watching a pair of soldiers creep past. It rose soundlessly from the murky pool and grabbed an ankle in mid-stride. A dull electric crackle and the soldier dropped like a sack. The second soldier yelled and shot the pale creature down, and heard it splash back in the black water. Before he could go searching for its body, he spun at the sound of running footsteps in the forest. A flying spear shot through the night and dropped him dead. A tall hunter strode after it, his bronze fur gleaming silver in the moonlight. He wrenched his spear from the invader’s chest and walked off into the black.

The forest came alive that night. The moonlight made shifting silver spirits of the world. A soldier was tripped by a muddy root that grew scaled arms and red eyes, and strangled her in the dirt. In a lonely stretch of woods, a clumsy booted foot dropped through branches and leaves onto a bamboo spike; the black silence shattered by a sudden bloodsquelch scream.

Down by the lake, a pair on patrol studied three bobbing dots coming closer in the night. Wait... those were eyes, reflecting the moonlight. No – two eyes and a lens. A rifle scope. A screeching lasershot dropped one soldier dead. Tabitha took a glancing bolt of light in the shoulder, and stormed out from the trees to put a crackling shot in his head.

A hired killer breathed fast and panicked in the endless night. She snapped her rifle this way and that, at the screams and running footsteps in the distant dark. Heart hammering in her dry mouth. She backed right into a tree; spun and shot it without thinking. She froze then, and turned back slowly at a low, raw, growl. A big scarred savage gripped her rifle and pulled it from her shaking hands. Icy eyes glinting in the full moon. Behind his hateful stare, endless nightmares of losing his little girl again, over and over, to the demons’ hidden bombs. Sharp teeth snarling. His glass knife glistening.

Far off on the hilly plains, the first report came in to the troops’ new camp. A dropship squad on recovery confirmed the bloody bodies of two infantry. Not stabbed or shocked like they’d seen before, but throttled and beaten to death. The pale-faced officer running the communications desk barely had time to respond before the next report came in.

‘There’s someone out there,’ said one of the reinforcements, sitting down stiff and pale in the busy habitat tent nextdoor.

‘Some thing, you mean?’ her friend replied, shovelling rations into his mouth. ‘There’s only animals on this planet.’

‘No, I mean a person,’ the woman snapped, with a haunted look. Watching the pitch-black night beyond the plastic windows. ‘Some species we’ve never seen before. Maybe alien. She’s hunting us.’

Captain Atha’s radio blinked into panicked life by the hour. Sometimes four or five times in succession. The rest of the time he was babysitting the terrified rookies and rogue mercenaries who staggered back to camp, often without their squads and partners. Not one had reached the hidden front line he’d set around the mountain. The gunships he could spare to take out the natives’ home, and lure that monstrous reptile back to his tanks... they were gone. Now the reports were coming in so frequently that the makeshift base was on full alert. The captain’s most capable lieutenant had, by one terrified account, been speared and drowned. In a puddle. Another young gunner, fresh out of training, hunted and eaten by some giant snarling beast. Their two best medics, out on search and rescue, beaten savagely and dragged away into the night.

‘Why aren’t you on watch, Private?’ Atha demanded of a frightened young woman, clutching her rifle as if it anchored her to sanity.

‘They’re howling,’ she stammered fearfully, as she wandered inside with a haunted look.

‘Howling?’ Captain Atha replied, incredulous. ‘Are you a trained Guardian or not!?’

‘It’s not just that, Captain... it’s the people they’ve caught. They’re making them scream to us, from the forest. It’s so fucking creepy.’

‘Get back to your post!’ Atha roared at her, watching her run from the habitat tent. ‘Orbit, where are those gunships!?’ he yelled into his wristcom. He downed his stimulant drink and grabbed his rifle as he headed outside. Panic and fear hung in the air like lead. That meant he wasn’t doing his job.

‘This is Tank One, we’ve got long-range visual, Captain!’ a voice crackled over his wristcom, as Atha walked into the cold night air. ‘They’re massing in the tree line!’

‘Well fucking open fire!’ he roared at the towering tanks on legs. Both of them solid and still.

‘Yes sir,’ replied the voice on his wristcom. The tanks’ giant turrets whirred around and boomed blinding thunder into the night. Monstrous laserbolts blazed through the black world like hellfire distilled. An acre of forest collapsed in bright flames. A distant crag exploded in a cloud of light and ceased to exist; the blast echoing through the world. The troops cheered as the tanks’ gatling lasers hummed into electric life. Clustered gun barrels thicker than chimneys began to turn. Whirring, and spinning faster. Spitting endless thrashing hails of screeching light; thumping warzone flashes across the horizon in a thousand pounding bursts.

‘Back to the mountain! Now!’ Tabitha yelled desperately, as the massing tribe were suddenly screaming and scattering under toppling trees. The forest was burning and dropping all around them; a deafening onslaught of whipping lights. The plain beyond the forest had become a churning field of blue-fire craters, under a booming fake-storm sky; there was no weather or disaster they’d seen to compare with it.

‘Back!’ Tabitha yelled at the panicked stragglers; a few still raging to fight. Barks and shouts echoed in the dark forest all around her. She stared at limp bodies and bleeding wounded, dragged or carried away in the night. One of the Bronzebacks just stood terrified; pissing himself as the trees collapsed in burning blasts and lightning flashes. Tabitha yelled into his stunned face and pulled him away through the trees.

‘Cease fire,’ Captain Atha told his wristcom. He watched Tank One’s thundering guns fall silent and stop turning as it powered down. ‘Tank Two, cease fire!’ he shouted into his wristcom. The second giant’s roaring guns still hammered the burning landscape endlessly. Three-storey cannons still shuddering under their own colossal force. ‘Tank Two, fucking ceasefire!’ he bellowed.

‘Yes Captain,’ the voice on his wristcom replied. The metal monster finally whirred down where it stood in the night above him. Its silent smoking cannons glowed a hissing heat-hazing red.

‘Fucking meatheads,’ Atha growled, turning to the rest of the base. ‘Speakers up,’ he told his wristcom, tapping the mic to make sure it echoed across the camp. ‘Alright, everyone back to your posts,’ he commanded them. ‘When those backup gunships break orbit I want them running search and rescue. All medics to the landing pads, on standby. Mining and Engineers back on point, double time. Let’s get this done.’

‘Yes sir!’ the Guardians yelled in unison across the base. Some of the mercenaries, recruited to swell their ranks, gave half-arsed replies. Moments later the base was alive with fresh activity. Floodlights burst fake daylight across the complex. Monstrous mining rigs crunched and shook back to life, and ate the ground for gold. Medics bustled past as Captain Atha strode off for the armoured gate.

‘Is there a problem, Tank Two?’ he demanded of his wristcom. The one that wouldn’t cease fire on his command.

‘Yeah,’ the tank pilot replied, on the small screen. ‘My brother was out there tonight. They killed him.’ The man looked strung out. He was high on something, and he didn’t look like Guardians material.

‘You’re a contractor?’ said the captain. No reply. ‘Pilot, answer the question. Are you a mercenary?’

‘...Yes, Captain,’ the man growled. Shit.

‘You were hired strictly as infantry. How did you come to pilot that tank?’

‘Amazing where you can get with the right stolen uniform, Captain.’ Shit shit shit.

‘The crew–

‘Are with me, Captain,’ the man replied smugly. ‘I always wanted to run one of these things.’

‘Pilot, power down your vehicle,’ Atha said carefully.

‘No, sir,’ the voice replied stubbornly, as the towering machine whirred back to life and took a stomping footstep toward the gate.

‘I said power down your vehicle, now!’ Atha growled into his wristcom. No reply. The monstrous tank was stomping off through the opening gate. No way the barrier would stop that thing. Better open than broken down.

Fuck, the captain told himself. We’re glorified cops trying to manage junkies and hired killers, and The Four want us to maintain discipline?... Why the hell did they force us together if they expected discipline?

‘Go fuck yourself, Tank Two,’ Atha told his wristcom, giving up. Like I’m even Guardians any more. Why pretend. All he got was laughter in response.

‘Think about it,’ the mercenary replied on his wristcom. ‘An unsanctioned mining operation on a no-go world, for an illegal paycheck, to enable a government coup. Waging war on the natives in the process. We’re breaking every law there is. You going to report me or something, Captain? Lose your jackpot and wind up in jail for the rest of your life?’

‘Hell no, Tank Two,’ Atha sighed in response, watching the metal monster thumping off across the plain. ‘I’m here to retire. After years of high-risk, grossly underpaid service.’

‘Me too, Captain. Welcome to the freelancers.’

‘Fine,’ Atha sighed. ‘Good hunting, shithead.’

‘You too, you controlling bastard,’ the mercenary replied. ‘Probably see you in hell.’ Atha spat on the dirt as he watched the tank wade off through the distant forest with crashing stomps. He looked back at the bustling base, and thought of the money, and wondered if any of these sorry bastards still had a scrap of discipline left to work with. It wasn’t coming from him these days; that was for damn sure.

‘Should I pursue, Captain?’ said Tank One over his wristcom. A trained Guardian.

‘Admirable, but no, pilot,’ Atha sighed. ‘Personally, I feel safer with him off the base. He’ll just get lost anyway, and blow off steam. When he gets back he’s an automatic arrest, and I need that tank back in one piece. And I want you here in case that big firebreathing bastard comes back.’

‘Yes sir.’

‘Alright people. Hit that gold quota, so we can get off this shithole,’ Atha growled over the camp’s loudspeakers. It’s not like I’ve got a Guardians career any more. Fuck it. ‘Anyway, who wants to get rich?’ his echoing voice met with a bright cheer across the base. ‘Then get to work, you lawless bastards. For the glory of the great Ministry.’ The laughs all over camp said all he needed to hear. For years his Ministry paycheck had rented him a shitty existence back home. Life was actually comfier on campaign. Every penny he made had paid for his kids’ private schooling in a better city. Once in a while, when his leave and their school terms aligned, he even got to see them. He got to see their days and months and years running away from him. He missed their voices, and their hugs, and kept forgetting they were too big and embarrassed for hugs any more. More recently though, his questionable new employers had just had a real estate company send him photos of his new penthouse on Serenity. The kids would move to a top school in Capital City. They’d live with him. He’d finally get to see them grow up, on the best world there was, and the thought made him want to cry.

Fuck loyalty, Atha told himself, when the pangs of the Good Old Guardians pricked his conscience. Most of his friends from basic training were sectioned, or dead. His pension wouldn’t even get him out of his mouldy apartment when he retired, if he lasted that long. I’m as loyal to the Ministry as they’ve been to me. I just got headhunted for better pay and early retirement, that’s all. Fuck ‘em.

By dawn Tabitha had led the tribe back to the foothills to rest their wounded, and bury their dead after all that frightening artillery. More people, gone. It’s all my fault. She caught herself staring blankly at the windswaying bamboo; terrified at just how outgunned they really were. Seven roared and circled above, warning them. Descending.

‘What’s wrong?’ Tabitha called up to him, attracting the tribes’ worried stares as they tended to their moaning casualties. Turning around, she glimpsed the distant shape in the dawn light, taller than the forest, and ran. Seven dropped like a rock and crashed through the trees nearby; Tabitha was sprinting for him.

‘Go!’ she yelled, grabbing a wing as Seven launched himself over the trees. Scrambling into the saddle as they soared over the lake, Tabitha followed Seven’s gaze towards the clunking giant in the far distance. That tank. Felling trees by the dozen as it hauled its colossal frame ever closer to the tribe, one ground-shaking step at a time. Glowing dots were spraying from it in shining lines towards her; those giant gatling guns echoing through the world. Racing lights screeching past her as Seven pulled away from the shots.

‘Go high!’ Tabitha screamed, sinking into the cockpit to take control. Seven’s jetscales flared white as he shot skywards in a supersonic boom. Twisting and veering from the shrieking shots until they were too high to hit. Breaking through the dawnsilver clouds Seven stretched his wings and snarled white fire; snaked his body and dropped. Tabitha clutched the seat in the cockpit as gravity gripped her stomach and multiplied inside her; Seven fell like a bomb. White flames streamed from his growling teeth; eyes shining like death. The forest and the stomping tank appeared through the clouds below, growing bigger by the second. Seven dropped on the colossus and scorched a glowing red trench along its top. Battered by a hail of sudden laserfire, he snarled and escaped it. The thing was bristling with guns; every brand of murder there was. All of it filling the sky in an endless blizzard of light. When the giant turret snapped around and shot it almost blew Seven out of the sky. Gasping as they spun away, Tabitha watched the giant laserbolt blow a distant mountaintop to dust. This thing alone could kill every tribe on the planet. And still it stomped ever closer to Sacred Mountain, where Sky Tribe were watching terrified and burying their dead.

‘Think,’ Tabitha told herself; told Seven. She swerved him aside in a lurching panic as more cannonbolts crackled away into the sky. ‘We can’t just burn it!’ Tabitha replied to Seven’s thought. ‘You didn’t even dent it!’ Seven grunted and ignored her as they shot back for another run at the stomping giant. He belched a pillar of light across its steel flanks redundantly, and took a dozen agonising shots for trying. Seven tore away into the clouds before the booming artillery could drop him from the sky.

‘I said it won’t work!’ Tabitha yelled at him angrily. ‘You’re going to get us killed!’ They swept down again for the mountains and the distant tank. It’d already stomped a trail of destruction through the forest; it was reaching the lake. Beyond that were the foothills, and Sky Tribe, fleeing for their lives. If she didn’t do something right now, this thing would wipe them out.

‘Come on!’ she growled at herself, searching the cockpit walls as she tried desperately to think. The thing’s armour was so thick there was nothing Seven could do, and he was too big a target. What the hell could they do? Unless... Be a smaller target.

‘Seven, drop me on top of it!’ she said, punching the glowing patch on her seat to spring her back out on his saddle. She took off her harness as Seven dived for the hulking tank.

‘Gunships!’ she called to him, looking back at twin dots in the sky. ‘Take care of them Seven, leave me to it!’ Seven roared at the sudden cannons crackling and bursting on his scales as he landed on the tank. He growled and shielded Tabitha as she dropped down running, and took off for the distant gunships as a cannonbolt thundered past his head. Tabitha sprinted along the tank’s giant back and launched herself at a whirring turret; yelled and leapt and clawed it to sparking scrap. She pulled her rifle on another spinning turret and blew it apart in a burst of light. She spotted a hatch and dropped on it in a frenzy. Tabitha shocked and clawed her way down inside the hatch and dropped a soldier with a smoking hole in the head. Spun at gunshots and filled the metal corridor with screaming laserbolts. She watched a distant form fall down dead, her mind racing on adrenalin, and suddenly she was running. She burst someone’s nose and grabbed another by the throat before they could pull their pistol. Shocked them with a crackling snap and pushed them aside as they slumped to the floor. Tabitha kicked the door open on a side turret and shocked the gunner before he could struggle out of his seat. She hurtled on down the narrow noisy passage for the pilot’s hatch. Clawed it open and took half a dozen lasershots that dropped her, smoking. She heard alien words from inside the cockpit as the figure appeared in the doorway. Laughing and cursing. She watched his face drop when he saw she wasn’t dead. He raised his pistol; her hand shot out and gripped his ankle. Dropped him in jolting shocks until he was shaking and drooling. Tabitha dragged herself into the cockpit and grabbed the controls; screaming in pain and riddled with sizzling gunshots. Too angry and terrified and adrenalin-high for thoughts. The gatling guns outside the windows suddenly spun and thundered at Sky Tribe in the distance. Tabitha jammed the controls right and felt the lumbering monster turn, only a few hundred yards from where the tribe sheltered. The intercom came alive with alien voices on board, demanding to know why they were turning away. They screamed even louder when they realised they were heading straight for a towering rockface beside them.

‘Good morning, this is your captain speaking,’ Tabitha spoke into the mic beside her, her voice echoing through the metal giant. ‘Just to let you know that you can all go fuck yourselves. Hold on tight now.’ Tabitha pushed the controls full-forward and stomped the colossus into the towering crags. Scrambling out into the corridor as a jagged boulder crushed the cockpit to bent metal and broken glass. The corridor jolted and began to tip. The tank stumbled and collapsed against the wall of rock. Cannons bent and burning under its gigantic weight as the thing tried to right itself. Tabitha clawed onto the walls as the tank fell and the corridor tilted into a lift shaft beneath her. Grunting and struggling as she scrambled back up into the cockpit, and edged her way out through the jagged broken canopy. No sooner had she grabbed the peering rockface than the colossus creaked and dropped from under her. The metal giant tore the crag apart in a rockfall dustcloud and collapsed in sparking flames.

‘Oh, shit,’ Tabitha mumbled, as the whole boulder trembled and slid in her hands. The cliff beneath her had been carved into a sudden sheer overhang by the fallen tank. Terrified, Tabitha scrambled for a handhold above her. The entire overhang cracked and gave. She dropped screaming; the tank burned below. A black shape snatched her from the air and shot away as the cliff crashed down to bury the fallen tank. Tabitha smiled at the roars and cheers from the tribe, hidden in the forest below. She patted Seven’s neck gratefully as the harness grew around her. There was a sharp bang, away behind them; Seven hovered to watch as something burst under the rubble.

‘That looks loud,’ Tabitha muttered, as she glimpsed some kind of reactor glowing eerily beneath the landslide. The thing exploded and blinded the world; a bright blue blast so fierce and deafening that it levelled the trees around it. Tabitha watched in stunned silence as a rolling cloud of shining electric blue tumbled up into the sky. Hands clamped on her ringing ears as the explosion vibrated in her chest. Sky Tribe came running from the trees to watch the towering blue blaze. Yelling and cheering, and spitting raw bloody curses at the black twisted wreckage, while stones and pebbles still rained down over the lake. They were chanting something rough and rising to its burned ruins; she could hear the victory in their tone. Like they were praying the dead colossus into hell.

‘You’re right,’ she told Seven, feeling his thought in her head. There’d be more. There were always more. The time to strike was now. To run the invaders off this world with one hard bloody lesson, before they could call down any more metal monsters on top of them. Tabitha thought of Earth, and the Watchers, and felt her rage rising.

Never again. She took a deep misting breath in the winter air, and killed her fear completely. These people had been pushed far enough. Looking them in the eyes, she could see what was coming next. All she could do was prevent a massacre.

‘Sky Tribe!’ she called out, landing Seven with a thump beside the tank’s flaming wreck. All their eyes were on her in the heavy silence. This is it, she told herself. Fight for this world, or watch it die. Tabitha tried to recall one of the few Stormish words she knew; the only one she needed. The one she saw in all those tired angry stares.

‘War!’ she yelled. Sea Mist and Stone Shore raised their knives at the tribe’s deafening cheer. Tabitha raised her rifle high; drowned in the crowd’s howling shouts. Felt her heartcore pounding at the sound. The tribe echoed her call so loudly that it rang in her head. She turned Seven away to walk him on through the trees. Howling and roaring for bloody vengeance, the tired grieving tribe took up their knives and spears and followed their queen for the plains.

37

The cold wind whipped Tabitha’s hair as she walked Seven over the hillcrest; the winter sun shone through it with a bright bloody glow. Down on the plain the invaders were massing around their camp; the remaining tank towered above them. All of them watching her in silence. Tabitha gripped Seven’s saddle scale with a hard leather creak. Seven growled and shook his shoulders restlessly.

I need you with me, she told him, his massive strength shifting and steadying beneath her. Now more than ever. She felt Seven’s giant anger growing and churning, right there in the back of her mind; a hurricane inside her. She watched the invaders in the morning light, and made sure they were looking. Made sure they could see the oncoming storm. Breathing, deep and nervous, in the silence.

Tabitha raised her stolen rifle high in defiance, and Sky Tribe emerged from the hills behind her. The invaders stared in horror as the army appeared, slowly lining every hilltop. Bronzebacks. Red-eyes. Cave Clan. Filling the horizon under a flaming dawn sky.

‘Rise up!’ Tabitha yelled out. ‘Rise up, and fight for your world! Fight for your lives!’ Deep Roots watched her signs and called out her meaning to the rest. ‘They’re burning your homes! They’re killing your children!’ she urged them. ‘For god’s sake, fight back! Take back what’s yours, or lose it forever! Take it in blood!’ Barkless Tree thought of all those smoking bodies and howled at the sky; a long sad cry that shattered the heavy silence. Stone Shore beat his chest in grief, and joined his own howl to the fading stars. Deep Roots too, and Sea Mist with him. Dozens more took up the call, then hundreds; a haunting chorus that rose and grew over the moor. A thousand raw howls filled the dawn world, echoing in the winter hills. But more voices than Sky Tribe alone. At its edges more distant clans were joining them, with Barkless Tree’s long-gone messengers leading them back. Fierce white brutes from the northern ice fields. Small hard grey-furs from the sea. All of them stolen from, and grieving. All of them joining the call.

The outnumbered invaders watched the scene with biting dread; mumbling and coughing in their own heavy silence. Checking their rifles, or clutching the barricades tight. Shuffling closer together despite themselves. Glancing nervously at other species on either side.

‘You will hold this base!’ Captain Atha bellowed at their massed ranks, walking the line. Clawing for some kind of discipline. ‘As of now, you resume your duty as Third Battalion in the Guardian Galactic Military!’

‘Yes sir!’ his men and women called out, among the silent mercenaries who swelled their numbers.

‘You’re trained killers, every one of you!’ Atha yelled. ‘I don’t care if there’s ten thousand of those savages, you will hold this fucking base! Who are you!?’

‘Third Battalion, sir!’ the troops yelled out together.

‘Who holds the Frontier!?’ Atha called out.

‘Sons of Sorrow, and Daughters of Death!’ his Guardians chanted back.

‘Who holds the Frontier!?’ Atha bellowed.

‘Sons of Sorrow, and Daughters of Death!’ his soldiers yelled in fierce unison.

‘Then load up and give them all fucking hell!’ he roared, smiling at their cheers.

Tabitha glanced over her shoulder before she led the charge. She looked at all those hard growling faces; all that anger and grief. A thousand snarling warriors at her back, hell-bent on revenge. A tall scarred male walked out onto the field alone. The invaders’ distant cheering had turned him rabid. It was Stone Shore, glaring at the demons across the plain. All eyes on him. With a sudden roar in the silence, he lifted his knife to the sky. His strongest fighters, his old retainers, pushed out of the crowd to line up with him in ritual. They barked and called together, staring their enemy down. Swift Blood joined them with his own Bronzeback champions, and Cold Moon with her Red-eye best. Whooping and yelling; pulling their knives. Stone Shore’s blood-curdling roar rose up from some raw feral underworld. Eyes wild and spit flying, he bellowed every curse he knew at the invaders in the distance. Clenched his fists and pounded his chest in a deep booming thump that echoed across the field. He stomped the grass in a roaring tirade, uniting his war-band in the winter light.

‘Hold fast!’ he yelled out, in the ancient prayer. Pacing the grass. ‘Hold fast, and turn your hearts to stone!’ A barking yell in the silence. ‘Invaders walk our land!’

‘I call down the spirits!’ his war-band chanted back. ‘May the Ancestors pull the bones from their living flesh!’

‘Your hands do the Ancestors’ will!’ Stone Shore replied. ‘Pull their bones yourself!’

‘We are the hunters! We are the flame! We are the noise in the dark!’ they chanted.

‘Cut them down!’ Stone Shore roared.

‘Rain their blood on the growing forest! Slaughter their band for our strength!’ They called back. Their rough booming voices filled the plain; their hissing and chanting scared up mothbirds from the trees. They bared their teeth at distant frightened faces; thumping their chests and calling them out to fight. Tabitha had never seen anything like it. Her ears pounded at a deafening war cry all around her. This was it. They were looking to their queen to lead them.

‘If you want your freedom, fight for it!’ Tabitha yelled over the snarling horde. ‘Follow me, and take back your world!’ She poured her thoughts into Seven’s and felt him roar thunder beneath her. ‘Charge!’ she screamed at them, loosing Seven onto the field in a heaving gallop. The Sky Tribe poured over the hilltops at her back, swarming the moor as they ran yelling for the invaders.

‘Fire!’ Atha bellowed at the ranked soldiers, dropping his hand at the tank behind them. Its giant cannons cracked and boomed; the moor exploded in ground-shaking thuds. Pounding blasts burst the tundra and blew sprinting tribals into the air.

‘Charge!’ Tabitha yelled again, urging Seven on. The clans swept across the plain like a tide behind her. Breaking ahead of the roaring tribe, Seven raced across the moor in a stomping gallop. Jetscales burning, he leapt and soared above the rushing plain. He shot for the base and grappled the gun-screeching tank with a savage crash. Clawing its huge metal head, Seven dragged the tank aside before it could fire again on the charging tribe. A gun-rattling chaos erupted from the soldiers behind them as the tribe closed the gap. Tabitha leapt Seven into the air and crashed him down on the tank again; his tyrant jaws ripped a turret to scrap. Tabitha focussed his rage on the hatch beneath them and tore it wide open in his teeth. She took searing shots in the shoulder and gunned down her attacker below. Dragging away another cannon viciously, Seven ripped a screaming gunner from the torn turret and spewed white flames in the metal wound. The tank’s insides hissed and burned. Tabitha heard screams. Horror hit her, like she was almost human again. Until she remembered that it was her, or them.

I told you not to fuck with us. Seven clamped his jaws on the open hatch and filled the tank with rushing fire. Glowing metal bled through the tank’s molten cracks and slopped hissing among the yelling soldiers below. The gutted tank staggered with a deafening bang, collapsing dead on the field. Seven leapt away to sweep over the base. Soldiers ran in panic as the tank’s reactor blew in a violent shining cloud; their ranks were broken as the tribe came roaring in. Tabitha watched; time crawled. Hundreds of snarling sprinting warriors launched spears and arrows and knives into the coming fray. Yelled and roared and leapt crashing into armoured troops, flooring them in a hail of screams and flying fur. The polar brutes tackled the fixed barriers so hard that crouching soldiers were thrown back behind them. Knives out, Bronzebacks and Cave Clan leapt laserfire barricades and pounced yelling invaders to the ground. The hurtling horde smashed the line like a freight train and swamped the base; clawing and stabbing and beating the demons to screaming bloody ruin. Tabitha gave Seven free reign and gunned down whatever she could see; the rifle thundered hard flashes in her hands. A yelling massacre boiled around her as the clans took their bloody vengeance. Mobbing the troops with a savagery that even she found hard to stomach. Already the invaders were running from the carnage wherever they could; fleeing a fight that would never be covered by their paychecks.

They’re not fighting for their home, Tabitha told herself. Not like the clans. The beaten soldiers were running for dropships descending on their base; hovering spacecraft that machine-gunned Seven’s giant wing with laserbolts as he shielded the natives. Lifting the captain and his survivors away. Escaping the chaos down below.

In minutes the gory battlefield had fallen quiet. Gargling troops’ throats bitten into silence by bloodsoaked tribals. Tabitha looked around at the silent base, and the bodies on the smoking silent plain. There was so much death here. They hadn’t started this... but they’d finished it. They’d been pushed to it; to fight for their home. Stone Shore’s old retainers were gone; fallen defending him. He stood grieving silently by their bodies, clutching a streaming wound in his arm. Over there was Deep Roots, exhausted, but mostly unharmed. Sea Mist, limping forward, and Barkless Tree. Tabitha sighed in heavy relief when she saw them. She just wished there were more survivors in the silent crowd.

The Bronzebacks’ speed on the plains hadn’t worked in their favour; they’d been decimated at the head of the charge. Their alpha, Swift Blood, had a dazed broken look. Tabitha walked over to clutch his shoulder, and shared his heartbroken gaze in the silence. Looking around them at the crowding tribe, she felt every stare. Despite their dead, despite the horror, a deafening cheer erupted around her. Their primal chant filled the moor under a rising sun. Familiar words that Tabitha couldn’t pronounce in the tribe’s own tongue, but she knew the meaning. Sky Queen.

A spluttering cough filled the fresh silence behind her. There was a mercenary soldier lying there, leaning wounded against torched rubble. Watching the red-haired creature standing in her dark monster’s carnage, staring. Gold eyes watching him die. Crawling away, gasping for breath, the invader stared in terror as Tabitha walked after him. A black-clawed figure stalking him, wreathed in white fire.

‘...What are you?’ he croaked, clutching the wound in his chest. Tabitha didn’t say a word. She only walked closer, raising her rifle. She looked into those frightened alien eyes, and hesitated.

...Maybe there’s some humanity left in me after all. Tabitha lowered the gun, and walked away. She didn’t have the right to kill him. He belonged to Sky Tribe now, just like the rest of the captured and wounded. That was their way. But the Bronzebacks and Red-eyes rushing past her were pulling their knives. Descending on the invader who’d killed their loved ones, and burned their homes to the ground. Tabitha couldn’t look back when she heard him screaming, but she didn’t stop them either. This was their way; the Ancient Way. She let the people take their justice. It was only what she would’ve done to the Watchers.

Cave Clan showed a little more restraint. They’d bound their captives; ready to march them away to Sacred Mountain in the distance. Walking back to Seven, and trying to blot the morning from her mind, Tabitha stroked his snout and asked if he was alright. Seven gave her a tender nudge and rumbled his reply. The iron stink of blood carried on the winter wind, as Tabitha looked back at the growing crowd around her. They were cheering her; raising their knives and spears. Barking and howling to the Sky Queen on the burning plain.

38

‘You people work me three times harder than anyone else. You cut my lunches, and don’t pay me. Shit job. I’m leaving.’

‘You’re contracted here for three years, friend,’ the blue man behind the desk explained. ‘You can’t just leave.’

‘I’m a slave here!?’ Big Fish rumbled angrily. His mane of tentacle-fins turned a deeper scarlet.

‘You’re a contractor,’ the man replied pleasantly. ‘The Ministry gave you new lungs, and a new life. Says here on your contract that you agreed to give them three years of good reliable construction work, by way of payment. Did you want to read your contract on the screen?’

‘Fuck your contract,’ the giant replied. ‘It’s slave chains, made from words and laws. You people don’t even have the honour to call it what it is.’

‘Look, take it up with the Minister for Development yourself,’ the man replied wearily. ‘Though if you ask me, you’re wasting your time. These new-body contracts are always watertight, believe me. For now though, do me a favour, okay? Get back to work.’

‘Clearing rocks for three years, with no pay!?’ the creature yelled furiously. ‘You don’t call that slavery!?’

‘Hey, take it down a notch, friend,’ the man replied, looking up as the giant towered over him. ‘Okay? Or do I need to get someone to escort you out?’

‘Try,’ the creature snapped, flipping the heavy desk like it was nothing. His skin was flushing to stark monochrome stripes. Terrified, the blue man backed away and edged along the wall for the door. A ton of pale aquatic muscle staring back at him.

‘Let me off this planet,’ Big Fish rumbled. ‘I’m not the Ministry’s slave!’ There were running boots in the corridor, getting close. The door hissed open; a pair of armoured Guardians shot to stun. The giant shook off the shock and smacked one of the troops clean across the room. Ploughed through the second man standing in the doorway and knocked a third to the floor as he charged out. Looking around at shocked mumbling contractors on lunch break, he took off down the corridor. Smacked another Guardian against the wall and broke down the door with a sparking crash. Suddenly he was out in the building site, under that same old murky sky he’d grown to hate. His open prison for weeks now, though no one called it what it was. Some unnamed building site for the Ministry. One of hundreds more in the Outer Rim, or so he’d been told. He was sick of mining and lifting rocks; he’d done that all his life. There had to be more. A chance at honour. Better to die in glory and war than live as a slave, like the great Foreshoalers had before him. Guardians were shouting; shooting at him. Next thing he knew he was running, sprinting, hurtling for the main gate. The troops ahead of him gave up firing their stun guns. Seeing that wild-eyed giant coming at them, all they could do was get out of the way. The creature was roaring by the time he reached the gate. No way was he staying stuck in here. No way. The heavy gate flew open in a thundering crash. The creature charged on; left the rest of the shocked staring slaves far behind. Clueless in their captivity; they couldn’t see their chains. He smashed through gear, transporters, heavy machinery... nothing mattered now. There was only freedom. There was only that supply ship up ahead, firing up and lifting off as he sprinted for it. With a booming growl he leapt for the closing ramp and wrestled his way inside. Resisted the sudden urge to beat everything to pieces in the cargo hold, and tear the pilots limb from limb. Instead, something else kicked in beneath all the rage. Some small scrap of restraint. The pilots were shut away in their cockpit. They didn’t know he was in here; not yet. Gasping for breath, he walked around on the spot; let his hearts beat out and slow down. He tucked himself in by the wall and a giant crate. The ship’s engines hummed and droned, and shot them into space. He expected one of the pilots to come back into the hold with a gun, but all he heard was a very definite clunk as the door to the cockpit locked shut. He’d just have to wait and see where the ship landed. Fight his way out on the other side, and get as far from civilised space as he could. And never, ever let anyone chain him again.

39

‘Hey you,’ Tabitha told Fishbowl warmly, sitting by her old hut. Smiling as she ran her fingers through its tapping arms. ‘The garden’s looking great.’ It was the morning after the tribe’s mournful burials and the great victory dance, and the mountain clearing was much more peaceful than usual. Most of the tribe was hung over, having indulged in huge amounts of that drugging root they loved so much.

‘Morning,’ Tabitha told Sea Mist brightly, as the woman shuffled past wrapped in a big fur. Sluggish, droopy-eyed, Sea Mist just shook her aching head and walked on toward the slope for a pee. Tabitha chuckled and threw tiny grit stones at her as she went; Sea Mist groaned quietly and tried to bat them away feebly as she wandered off with her hangover.

‘Loser,’ Tabitha heckled her, grinning. Lying back on the ground, she watched Fishbowl float away to water its glowing flowers, and the white clouds above in a rare blue sky. Closing her eyes for a peaceful nap, she couldn’t help but wonder what her dad would’ve made of her gardener from outer space. Or just any of this, come to think of it. She smiled at the thought as she nodded off.

The sun cast a cold golden glow over the rugged world. Waking a while later, Tabitha saw Deep Roots wave to her across the mountain clearing. He was teaching a handful of cubs how to draw their symbols on the rocks. Stretching with a sigh, Tabitha smiled and waved back.

You wouldn’t even know we’d been at war, she told herself. The surviving invaders had limped away on their dropships and taken their mining machines with them. Sky Tribe’s captives had been bound and marched up Sacred Mountain with them, until Tabitha could decide what to do with them. Bargaining power if nothing else, she supposed, if the invaders ever dreamt of coming back. It was a good idea on Stone Shore’s part; not to kill them outright. He’d surprised her in his new role as her general and retainer, over the past few days; he wasn’t the same furious unreasonable man she’d first met. Sea Mist, too; she’d insisted on learning all she could about the demons in case they came back. More than that though... she’d insisted on learning the Trade Language too, and set about it with a vengeance using Tabitha’s wristcom. Teaching Barkless and Deep Roots all she knew as she went along. They’re much faster learners than me, Tabitha told herself. A shadow beside her blocked the sunlight.

‘Hi Barkless,’ she said happily, patting the ground for him to sit down with her. It was rare to see the dark-furred wanderer so often; he’d normally be out in the wild trying some new idea. After all the tricks and inventions he’d learned from her, he was always keen to know more.

What should we do with the dead giant? He signed to her, shrugging and working his hands, and pointing to the dead tank on the far plains.

‘Just let it rot,’ Tabitha replied in broken Stormish, much to Barkless Tree’s satisfaction. ‘Best to leave it. Bad magic.’ She’d picked up that growling Stormish saying recently; bad magic. Cave Clan said it a lot.

You don’t believe in magic, Barkless replied, pointing a finger and shaking his head as he spoke the words. Grinning his pointed teeth.

‘No, you’re right,’ Tabitha replied, smiling as she signed. ‘So you don’t either?’

I’m an outcast for a reason, he replied, watching her chuckle. Flashing his sharp-fanged smile.

Is Sea Mist around? he asked her, searching the clearing from where they sat tucked away by the rock wall.

‘Why are you looking for her? ...Do you like her?’ Tabitha teased him, grinning.

She’s strong and pretty, Barkless replied, matter-of-factly. He pointed a thumb over his shoulder, made a digging motion, and shook his head with a sigh. She always finds me work to do. He pointed to his eyes and looked around, alert, and made as if to hide. I need to see her coming, he said. So I can stay away. Tabitha laughed.

‘I thought you liked having work to do?’ she asked him. ‘You hardly sit still.’

Interesting work, yes. New thoughts, yes. Sea Mist’s work, no. Boring.

‘Well, you can help me and Seven repair things, if you like,’ Tabitha replied, pointing to the damaged hall and the circling wall around them. ‘There’s plenty to do.’ Those gunships Seven had fought back from the mountain the other night had left great gnarled craters in the grown walls.

That’s better work, Barkless replied with a grin. All of a sudden he shot up in fright.

‘What’s wrong?’ said Tabitha, getting up to stare into the sky beside him. There was a speck there. A distant ship. Panic spread through the clearing as more of the tribe caught sight of the gleaming white dot.

‘Everyone inside!’ Tabitha commanded them, as she strode into the clearing. Slipping back into the Sky Queen by reflex. Pointing Sea Mist and Deep Roots to lead everyone into Havenhall, as the distant ship loomed larger. ‘Barkless, get the prisoners out here!’ she told him. ‘If we die, they die. Go!’ He nodded and gathered a group to drag their captives out to the clearing. Tabitha whistled up at Seven on the outcrop; saw his white eyes snap down at her. ‘Be ready!’ she called to him. Seven’s rumbling growl echoed down the mountainside as they watched the white dot glowing orange; breaking the atmosphere. Tabitha’s wristcom flickered and mumbled into life.

‘Hello, can you hear me?’ said an otherworldly man in the Trade Language, appearing suddenly on the small screen. Tabitha stared intently, the screen’s white glow lighting her face. Her earpiece translated his words.

‘Are you the one who ordered the invasion?’ she asked him angrily, in wooden Trade Language. Wondering if he could see her through the wristcom.

‘Oh goodness, no,’ the bright-skinned man replied emphatically. ‘We’ve nothing to do with those vicious thieves, I assure you. No, our Guardian police apprehended a band of mercenaries trying to leave this system, with gold mined illegally. During questioning they told us everything. So, we’ve hacked this wristcom to make contact, and guarantee your safety. May we speak with your leader?’

‘You are,’ Tabitha snapped distrustfully. ‘I lead this tribe. I’m the Sky Queen.’

‘...Your Majesty,’ the alien addressed her, bowing his head with fresh reverence.

‘What do you want?’ Tabitha demanded, unsure if her Trade Language was right.

‘Well, we’d like to meet you, Majesty, if we can,’ the man replied, with a look of concern.

‘No. Leave us alone,’ Tabitha snapped. ‘No more visitors. You’re corrupting this people and their world, can’t you see that?’

‘We understand, Majesty, of course,’ the man replied cautiously. ‘We merely wished to extend our deepest sympathies, for the tragic events your people have suffered. And to extend an offer, to ensure that this never happens again.’

‘Who are you?’ Tabitha demanded.

‘My name is Qos, of the Interworld Ministry. At your service, Majesty,’ the man replied warmly, with a slight bow. ‘I would be honoured to meet with you, only briefly, with an offer of protection and prosperity for your people. Won’t you at least hear me out?’

Interworld Ministry... I’ve heard of that before, Tabitha told herself, thinking back over everything she’d learned on her wristcom. Somewhere out there, they run everything.

‘And you’re not connected with those invaders? In any way?’ said Tabitha.

‘No, Majesty. I assure you,’ the dignitary replied. ‘...May we land?’

Tabitha watched the sleek white ship descending on the wild world, and felt a knot of tension in her stomach twist ever tighter. Fighting just to keep her hands from shaking. It felt like the fate of an entire world was resting on her shoulders. Some massive galactic superpower was descending to negotiate. How the hell had she got caught up in all this?

As the craft landed, a handful of beautiful leaders and ancient dignitaries emerged gracefully from the widening doorway. They glided angelic down the growing ramp to walk a respectful distance to Havenhall. A hundred yards or so; no troops with them. They made every possible sign to show that they came in peace. In the distance, Tabitha gulped nervously in her dry throat, and walked away into the hall. Time to receive her honoured guests... and try not to spark another conflict in the process.

‘What the hell is this place?’ one middle-aged dignitary whispered to another, as they crossed the mountain clearing. The alien smiled benevolently at the tribal beasts they passed on their way to the stronghold. Trying not to gag at the smell of sweat and soil on the biting winter air. A vast dark terror watched them from its rocky perch above.

‘Just get them to sign on the dotted line and let’s be done with it,’ another replied in a hushed tone, waving kindheartedly at the beast cubs that stopped and stared. ‘Buy her off. Throw the usual sales pitch at her. I don’t care. I don’t want to be here a moment longer than I have to.’

The Ministry dignitaries entered warily into the strange dark hall, their heads held high. They were hit by a sudden dog-like stench, earthy and overpowering. Flaming stone braziers lit the gloom with hellish flickering glows. The staring crowd of natives in here was nothing short of intimidating. The skulls of great beasts were lashed to the twisting pillars above their heads; the dark wood seemed to have been grown into shape. The visitors lost their lordly countenance as they walked further into the hall; slow cautious footsteps in the stony silence. Countless beasts lined the way, eyes glinting in the firelight. Brown and stocky, or tall and bronze and holding rough spears. Some were grey and thin, or shaggy white giants; others were night-black with unsettling looks. Every one of them stared the dignitaries down as they passed by nervously. Sharp teeth bared. Low savage growls in the silence. Pale, wide-eyed, the dignitaries found their way barred by a trio of hulking beasts, spears in hand, led by scarred Stone Shore. The visitors stood at a stalemate for some moments.

‘W-we wish to speak with your leader,’ the head dignitary Qos stammered, after an awkward silence.

‘She is Sky Queen!’ Stone Shore bellowed furiously, in broken Trade Language, spraying them with spit as he spoke. His deep hard voice echoed like thunder in the silent hall. ‘Name her!’ the dignitaries stared at the beast in terror, unsure whether to maintain eye contact. They glanced at one another nervously. Qos cleared his throat to speak in the silence.

‘I... I’m–

‘Name her!’ Stone Shore roared savagely, his voice echoing in the great hall. The tribe was growling angrily all around them, displeased. They’d had enough of visitors. To even enter the home of the queen and delay in naming her...

‘S-Sky Queen,’ the dignitary stammered. ‘We wish to speak with the Sky Queen.’

‘Approach,’ came a voice some way behind the guards, distinctly different in tone to the beasts that barred their way. Growling, Stone Shore stood aside and let them pass, staring at them until they lowered their eyes. What the dignitaries saw next shocked them; it was all they could do to keep their composure and continue their silent approach. Alien prisoners lined their way; mercenaries. They were on their knees, tied with rough leashes. The tribals their masters. They’d been stripped and shaved; beaten savagely. Broken creatures that didn’t even raise their eyes. And there ahead of them, the Sky Queen on her ghostly throne. Draped in animal furs; crowned with antlers. Face lit by the flickering flames. Hard gold eyes staring. The monumental wall behind her was a twisting chaos of frozen thorns, glowing with a pale white light. Her generals and advisors stood on either side, their necks draped in bones and sky-blue feathers. Sharp teeth bared, growling like the rest. Cowed, the dignitaries approached the foot of the throne. They stood and stared at the dirt floor before the queen, unsure if they were permitted to look up at her.

‘Kneel!’ Stone Shore roared into the silence, as hard and thunderous as a falling rock. Immediately the dignitaries took to their knees before the throne. The beasts crowded in behind them. Their savage smell filled the dignitaries’ heads. No escape. They knelt in the cold fire-crackling silence, afraid.

‘Speak,’ Tabitha commanded them. The kneeling visitors glanced at one another nervously.

‘…Truly, the rumours of your might and magnificence do you no justice, Sky Queen,’ the dignitary Qos began, stuttering and unsure. ‘We are but humble –

‘Spare me the bullshit,’ Tabitha cut in bluntly, as the earpiece translated their words. ‘Your soldiers have burned these people’s homes to the ground. Murdered their families. The only thing stopping them from tearing you apart right here, right now, is me. Tell me what you want.’

‘Those soldiers were not ours, I assure you, Majesty,’ Qos replied. ‘They are mercenaries, roaming the stars for whatever they can take. We do not know them. Our Guardian police fight and pursue them wherever they appear. On that you have my word.’

‘...Fine,’ Tabitha replied, keeping her doubts to herself. For now. ‘Tell me what you want.’

‘We merely wish to ensure the peace and prosperity of your world, Sky Queen,’ Qos stammered. ‘And to formally offer you a place on the Ministry council of federated worlds. To the immeasurable benefit of your people... and as security, against any future threats.’

‘No,’ Tabitha replied, disinterested. ‘We want nothing to do with you. Leave us.’

‘But my queen, surely you see the merits of such an alliance,’ another dignitary cut in. ‘This is the only way to ensure that more lives are not lost in further incidents. We must –

‘No!’ Stone Shore bellowed, gripping the shocked dignitary hard by the back of the neck to force his silence. ‘Sky Queen speaks no! You, no!’

‘Let him speak,’ said Tabitha. ‘Release him.’ Stone Shore grunted and shoved his victim forward, stepping away.

‘M-my queen, the soldiers who attacked your people were not ours,’ the rattled dignitary continued. Straightening his fine robes. ‘I assure you that they are mercenaries, driven by ruthless greed. If you were to accept our invitation onto the Ministry council, then we could protect your world from their kind decisively, and at all times. Leaving your people to thrive and prosper in peace.’

‘We’ll fight them ourselves,’ Tabitha snapped. ‘We defeated these invaders,’ she said, with a look to the beaten captives lining the way. ‘We’ll destroy anyone who comes after them.’

‘With respect, Majesty, I fear that you have faced only an expeditionary force. Were an entire army of such thieves to descend on your planet to take what they will... we would fear for your people. For your entire world. We would like to help.’

‘You want to colonise this world before they do,’ Tabitha cut in.

‘No, Sky Queen. I assure you, that is not our intention,’ Qos replied, shifting his weight uncomfortably on sore knees. ‘We would leave your world well alone, and only intervene directly if you asked us to. This is the official policy of the Interworld Ministry which we represent. We seek only to preserve life wherever it is discovered, and to engage in free trade and thought with other cultures, but only with those which are willing. If you were to take your place on our council, we could guarantee that your world could go on as it always has, evolving and developing, in peace. You have my word.’ Tabitha stared at him, his sincerity; mulling over his words. Beginning to doubt her conviction.

‘The real question, Majesty, is this,’ Qos continued respectfully. ‘What mounting dangers do you leave your people vulnerable to, by turning away from this alliance? Do you have the right to deny these people the chance of a peaceful and prosperous future? Of easier lives, free from war and bloodshed? Would you be remembered as the queen who said no to a better future? ...Could you not spare a day or two, and merely meet with our council on the capital world, if only to discuss some brighter alternatives for your people?’

Tabitha watched him and hesitated, trapped in her thoughts, as her earpiece translated his meaning. The temptation to ask Deep Roots beside her for advice was almost overpowering, but she stopped herself. Her people followed strength. Her word was law, not the word of Deep Roots. This was her decision, and hers alone. She couldn’t afford to show weakness, not even with this terrifying choice suddenly on her shoulders. To take her place on this Ministry council of theirs, and trust that her people would be protected… or to choose isolation, and fight any more invaders themselves. Possibly many more than they could hope to defend against. The new way, or the old. She glanced around at the Sky Tribe, some of them holding laser rifles they’d looted from the battlefield; others wore odd pieces of the invaders’ body armour lashed to their chests and shoulders. The future’s already collided with this world, Tabitha told herself. All I can do is make sure it’s a safe future for these people. I need to know more.

‘Let me speak with this council of yours,’ she commanded in her new regal tone, springing out her claws. The dignitaries nodded pleasantly before her. ‘But if my people are ever put in danger because of this, I’ll carve your eyes out myself. Is that clear?’

‘Perfectly clear, Majesty,’ Qos replied nervously, his fellow dignitaries nodding emphatically beside him.

‘Good,’ Tabitha replied casually, studying her claws. ‘Come back in three days. I’ll return with you, and speak with this council. You will not make contact with my people, and you will not land anyone on our world. Do you understand?’

‘Yes Majesty,’ Qos replied obediently.

‘Leave us,’ Tabitha commanded them, nodding to Stone Shore. Her general seized the dignitary by the back of the neck and dragged him to his feet, marching him off down the hall with the rest. Tabitha watched them in silence; watched her people stare after them growling as they left the hall. She just hoped she’d made the right decision.

‘Good,’ Deep Roots said quietly beside her, careful that no one saw him advising her. Turning to Sea Mist and Barkless Tree, Tabitha saw them nod in agreement. She breathed a little easier, and sat back in her throne. In three days she’d be leaving to speak with this mysterious council. At least she wouldn’t be going alone.

‘Sky Queen!’ Qos called from the entrance. Stone Shore gripped him furiously by the throat.

‘Let him speak,’ Tabitha commanded, motioning for him to return through the crowd.

‘Your prisoners, Majesty. These mercenaries. If you wish these men and women to live, they need urgent medical help,’ Qos said as he approached, looking at the tribe’s kneeling captives with concern. Tabitha glanced down at the broken invaders lining the way. They didn’t dare look up. He was right; those sorry bastards had been beaten half to death. If they didn’t go with the dignitaries now they might not last a few more days here. Her tribe was looking at her. All their eyes were on her. Expecting a show of strength. The Ancient Way.

‘No. They belong to us now,’ Tabitha said firmly, watching the looks of satisfaction among her tribe as Deep Roots translated. ‘These prisoners took the lives of my people. Now their lives are ours, to do with as we please. This is our way.’ The hall filled with grunts and barks of approval. ‘Leave us. Now.’

‘Yes, Sky Queen,’ Qos said hurriedly, bowing and scurrying away as Stone Shore shoved him off down the hall.

‘Good,’ Deep Roots said again, quiet as leaves in her ear, patting her shoulder when no one was looking. ‘Good.’ He left her there on the throne as her tribe began to look back at her, grunting and barking. Cheering her strength.

The days passed quickly; Tabitha wondered if she should’ve given herself more time to prepare. But at least she’d had chance to repair their home against the winter, and Stone Shore was more than happy to lead the tribe again in her absence.

Tabitha wanted to make it clear, via Deep Roots, that she was in debt to all these people. That no words could thank them enough for their work, and their sacrifice. Together they explained to the clans that they were free to disband, and go back to their lives and territories if that was their choice. Some of the huge Polars were lone wanderers and lifelong enemies, and gladly went their separate ways. Many already had. At least half of the Grey-furs had families waiting for them, and some just missed the sea. Cold Moon and most of the Red-eyes stayed with the Sky Tribe, but the more devout went back to their lives in the marshes. Their sacrificial kills were their way of life, they’d explained, and they couldn’t abide Sky Tribe’s ban. Cold Moon made no big deal about it; she simply said that they were free to leave.

But not one of the Bronzebacks or the Cave Clan would go, and most of the Red-eyes didn’t want to. The invasion had left them all grieving, and nervous about their future. But it’d bound them together, too; they’d fought and died together to live their free lives. Many of their beliefs were entirely opposed, and prompted no end of argument. But their few shared thoughts were enough to bind them... and it looked like there was more than one love story on the way. Plus, they couldn’t keep their noisy cubs apart. Hopefully, in time – and with Stone Shore’s unfailing ability to whip everyone into hard work – they could start to move on with their lives.

Tabitha explained to her generals that she was counting on them to keep things peaceful, or simply ask anyone with a problem to leave. Her biggest concern was that many had rifles now. She just hoped they wouldn’t use them to disagree.

But it’s only my job to lead them, Tabitha reminded herself. Not to rule over their lives.

‘Hey. You have to stay with the tribe while I’m gone, ok?’ she told Seven sadly that night. Pushing the words past the lump in her throat. Seven replied in her head that he didn’t want to be here if she wasn’t. He had to protect her.

‘I know,’ Tabitha replied gently, picking grass where she sat with him on the precipice. Dwarfed by him. ‘But I need you to protect these people. In case those invaders come back,’ she said. ‘Anyway, I’ll be back soon,’ she added brightly. ‘It’s only a couple of days. I promise.’ Seven sat in silence for a while, watching the glowing moon ripple on the lake. Mist curled like a dead tide through endless pines. The towering mountains were lost in the dark.

‘Please, Seven,’ said Tabitha. Eventually he replied in her head that he understood. Tabitha wiped her tears before he saw... though she knew that was kind of pointless if he could read her thoughts. ‘Thanks mate,’ she said quietly, sniffling. Seven’s sudden nudge pushed her right over on the ground and snapped her out of it. ‘Shithead,’ she told him with a grin, throwing a dull punch at his scales. Feeling his thoughts. ‘Come on then,’ she said happily, climbing into the saddle. Flaring his jetscales, she launched Seven into the night. Soaring over the moonlit lake and the mountains’ eerie snowcapped glow, under the frozen hail of a million glimmering stars.

Even just the thought of tomorrow terrified her. She’d be leaving this world. Talking politics, of all things. But she had to know the truth. Admittedly, the captives who’d answer her questions said that they really were just a free army of thugs looking for gold; they had the scars, stories and gang tattoos to prove it. Hard to spot a liar anyway, since she relied on that software to translate their alien words. Some didn’t speak Trade Language at all. But even if they were somehow connected with this Ministry... what could she do about it here? She needed answers, right from the top. If she really did have to go up against an empire over this, then the justice had to come from them too. She had to make sure Sky Tribe’s voice was heard.

I’m only going out there to make sure these people are safe, Tabitha told herself. And left the hell alone. Best to keep it simple. That was the only good reason to leave this world now... and the easiest choice was no choice at all. It had to be done.

‘Whoa,’ Tabitha mumbled the next morning, as Stone Shore presented the tribe’s gift to her outside Havenhall. A short cloak of mothfeathers, shining gas-puddle purple and blue. ‘You really didn’t need to kill so many mothbirds,’ she muttered sadly, desperate not to offend, as Stone Shore stepped around and hooked the cloak on her shoulders. ‘This is gorgeous. Thank you, everyone.’ She looked up grinning at the gathered tribe as Stone Shore stepped back, and Barkless walked up alongside with her crown. Sea Mist and Deep Roots came to stand beside them; her retainers. Bodyguards to the queen, in the boat that crossed the stars.

Snow fell heavily from a steel-grey sky. The hearthfire had been built up blazing, a bright beacon to the Spirit-world; chanted around loudly to ask First Ancestor for their safe journey. The tribe was whooping and calling as the Sky Queen and her retainers walked away down the snowy mountain; the cubs were still waving in the distance. Tabitha turned back for one last look, smiling to see them there, as she left her home behind.

Tabitha stood with Deep Roots, Sea Mist and Barkless on the lakeshore as a gleaming white starship swept down. The glowing engines beneath it rippled the lake widely as it slowed, and it landed massive before them on the shale.

‘Ready?’ Tabitha asked her friends nervously. Tucking her hair behind her ear in the bitter wind that ruffled her feather cloak. Deep Roots looked just as worried as her. Sea Mist replied with a confident shrug, holding the knife on her belt. Barkless was too busy gawking open-mouthed at the ship as its ramp descended. There was an echoing roar above them, over the lake; Tabitha smiled and waved at Seven’s goodbye. She turned to the elegant starship ahead of her, and the smiling stranger at the foot of the soft-lit ramp.

‘Welcome, Majesty,’ the alien figure said respectfully, with a gentle sweep of its hand to invite them on board. Its graceful robes contrasted sharply with the dull winter world around them; billowing in the chilly wind. Tabitha watched the figure with wide gold eyes, and managed a quick nod. The grey sky hung over bleak mountains around her.

I don’t want to leave my home again, she told herself, and she had to. Her next footstep broke her heart.

40

On a distant industrial world, in a ruined old factory, a lonely woman swallowed her sobs in the night. Drinking strong spirit from a dirty bottle in the moonlight. She threaded one of the surgical needles, and before she could talk herself out of it, poked it through her skin. She gasped at the piercing pain and tugged the needle through with forceps, and gulped the foul spirit with a coughing shudder. She bit her hand and screamed into it as she doused the knife wound with alcohol.

...Get on with it. She knotted the stolen thread through the gaping wound, and pushed the needle in again to stab a second stitch. Just like fixing clothes, she told herself. It really wasn’t. There hadn’t been this fierce pain, and her hands hadn’t been shaking, and the fabric wasn’t slick with blood. It’s alright. It’s just like fixing Ori’s clothes, when he was small. Despite herself, Aelu sobbed suddenly at the thought of her little boy. The only thought that kept her going. Revenge.

‘I’ll kill them,’ she growled into the dark rusting ruins. ‘I’ll fucking kill them all.’ She hadn’t been hiding in the galaxy’s strange frightening homeless dimension for very long, but it’d been a crash course. When her mistakes meant risking Guardian attention, or going hungry, or ending up sleeping in entirely the wrong part of town, she was learning fast. Her clothes stank from the driest sleeping spots she’d managed to find out here; some of which also happened to reek bitterly of piss. At first she’d been adamant on going it alone; sticking to the empty yards and factory ruins out here on the old industry world, Eitse. Before long though, she’d started to attract attention. There were men and women and creatures in the dark abandoned places, or people in parked cars who’d told her she was pretty, and had tried to touch her or swap food or drugs for dirty shuffling favours, and if you ever tell my husband I’ll kill you, but this kind of nasty hopeless shit really gets me off.

But there were decent people too; smiling creased toothless grins and laughing in crackling mucus lungs, and grabbing every free hospitality there was before she even had chance. That was the biggest surprise to her, and that was when she knew how much of a snob she’d really been. That there were nice people too; people who wanted to help and stick around and be her friends. People who, in better circumstances, would’ve been the most generous she’d ever known. In this weird alternate world though, they didn’t have anything to give but their time, and their friendship; their own sad stories and an ear for hers. She never told them why she was really out here. She couldn’t risk getting caught.

I just have to find out where my son’s killers are. Then I’m going to get off this world. She’d been telling herself that for a long time now. But hunger and fear, and stuff to make her forget, it all kept getting in the way. As soon as she could figure out how to get past security at the spaceport, or get that old ship working in the scrapyard, or get past the Guardians downtown without them recognising her, she was out of this hell.

She was glad she still had her gun. People treated her with respect. Granted, not the same respect she was used to back home, when her baking talents or volunteer work would get a mention in the local news. Out here was a different kind of respect that ran on fear. All different kinds of people, with different lengths they were prepared to go to, and different amounts of fear that kept them alive. When random strangers grinned and leered at her, then realised there was a gun aimed at them in the shadows, and saw that those angry desperate eyes behind it had already used that gun several times, then they gave her respect. All she’d had to do was tie that gun to her wrist like her life depended on it, because it did, and try not to sleep. Ever.

That bottle of something strong, possibly watered-down industrial from the way it burned her sore throat, it did the job. Aelu felt so numb and swimming from it that she had to focus just to get the needle back through her skin. She pinched the needle in the forceps and pressed the deep wound together, and poked it through with a piercing stab.

‘Fuck!’ she cried out, as quietly as she could, tensed up and eyes closed tight through the pain.

‘I can help with that, if you want,’ came a gravelly voice in the pitch-black factory. Aelu jumped in fright and pulled her gun.

‘Get away from me!’ she growled, with practised urgency.

‘I’m not going to hurt you,’ the rough voice replied, as a figure walked out slowly from the shadows further down the factory floor. Lit and rippling in the murky moonlight from the giant windows. His hands up in surrender.

‘But I’m going to hurt you, if you don’t fuck off right now,’ Aelu said nervously, training the gun on his shape as the shadowed figure stood still.

‘Fine, I’ll go,’ he said coolly, in that deep rasping voice. ‘I won’t bother you again. But if I can’t help you with that, at least take something better for the pain. I’ll leave them here. They’re clean.’ The figure set a bottle of pills on the moonlit floor. ‘They’ll help you through that. Stop you feeling it. Just don’t get addicted. Trust me.’ With that, the silhouette turned and walked away.

‘...Who are you?’ Aelu asked him. ‘Why are you out here?’

‘I just finished work,’ he replied. ‘This is one of the places I work. I wouldn’t recommend you stay round here.’

‘What work?’ she asked him, still holding the gun.

‘I break people,’ he said, matter-of-factly.

Oh shit. He’s one of those. ‘Why haven’t you broken me?’ Aelu said nervously.

‘No one’s paid me to,’ he replied simply.

‘...Thank you for the pills,’ said Aelu, her voice shaking in terror.

‘You’re welcome. I don’t like to see a lady in pain.’

‘...A lady?’

‘There’s no way you grew up on the streets,’ he replied. She still couldn’t see his face.

‘...If I get money, could you break someone for me?’ she said.

‘Yeah,’ he replied, as he walked away.

41

The Ministry aide held up her wristcom nervously, checking the time. Had she come to the right spaceport terminal? Had she missed them already? No, that couldn’t be it. She was right on time. She’d been right on time for three hours now, propping herself up on energy smoothies and phytoshots. Popping relaxants like sweets to steady her shaking hands, lest her guest should see any sign of weakness. Her guest didn’t abide weakness, and it was critical that she develop a strong relationship with her from the start. She tapped at her wristcom to remind herself of the concise introduction she’d agonised over all night. After all, this wasn’t just some military official or Ministry executive she was meeting this morning. This was royalty. The Sky Queen. Tribe-bringer. Warrior witch. That was what her people called her. The news reports said that she lived in a mountain palace and rode some great black terror into battle, with thousands of screaming savages at her back. Despite politically correct attempts from up top to play down the aggression in the rumours, the public heard what they wanted to. They wanted Queen of the Savages; a novelty. A living fairy tale, come roaring and screaming out of prehistory... so that’s what the media gave them. It showed in the ratings too, and suddenly everyone needed more content. More rumours. It was said that the few enemies she spared in battle were shorn and beaten; dragged off to her stronghold and kept as slaves. The skulls of fearsome beasts adorned her walls as trophies. They said that she never tolerated weakness of any kind. Gulping at the twisting butterflies in her stomach, the bright-skinned young aide looked up from her wristcom as a hush fell over the busy terminal. A parting in the distant crowd.

‘Make way for her Majesty the Sky Queen!’ a Guardian officer yelled out, echoing in the terminal’s bright space. There was a long hush, with the quietest of murmurs catching and spreading through the crowd. The aide felt her stomach knot; the wait felt like an eternity. All of a sudden the news teams were scrambling for a glimpse. Jostling for the first soundbite; calling out questions to the new visitor. But the crowd just kept parting, with nothing but stony silence from its heart. Suddenly the young aide felt her spine turn to jelly as she caught the distant silhouette, striding through the staring crowd. There she was; a living myth. Lean, and dirty, and fierce. Her bare footsteps rang with glass rings on her ankles and wrists. Bones and beads rattled on twine necklaces. Her shoulders were draped in oil-blue feathers and dead black fur. Two branched horns jutted from her red curls, like some demon from ancient tales. The Sky Queen in her antlered crown. Strange savage beasts strode along behind her; upright primal things as big as anyone she’d ever seen. The Sky Queen locked eyes with her as she approached. That hard gold stare cut right through her. Standing like a nervous servant, and tempted to move out of the way, the aide remembered that she had to meet with this woman. She had to direct her around the city, and see that she was treated with all the respect that a World Minister deserved. Suddenly the Queen was standing right in front of her. Shaking her hand with that five-fingered weapon, cold and hard and battled, while she stood there soft and numb and stupid. The crowd was staring.

‘Y-your Majesty,’ the aide began, blinking and foggy-headed. Spluttering the words from her dry mouth like crumpled paper. Gods, she’d overdone it on the stim drinks. Her mind was a frantic tangle. ‘It’s my extreme honour to have the, er, honour, of your presence, here on… er, I mean, our honour, on behalf of the Interworld Ministry, to, er...’ she took a breath. It was those gold eyes; cold and cutting. The way everyone around them jostled and called just to get a word from her. ‘Allow me to welcome you to our capital world, Serenity, er, and... if you’d care for, er, care to follow,’ the aide just trailed off weakly into an awkward blushing silence. With all the crowd and cameras staring at them from the press barrier, and a very specific schedule to win her guest around, this was not a good time to feel attracted to an alien monarch. Her boss should’ve been here to greet their guest instead. She’d practically just started her career; she’d never done this before. If the Ministry had any regard for their new visitor whatsoever, they might have sent someone with more experience to welcome her. The Sky Queen just stood there with an icy stare, gently extracting her hard black hand from the aide’s before she could shake it clean off her wrist.

‘...We’ve heard so much of all you’ve achieved, and your honour, and we welcome you, to er,’ the aide stammered, searching the floor for the words she’d memorised for days. With those fierce tribal bodyguards around them staring into her soul, she really just wanted to run away and hide.

‘It’s nice to meet you,’ the Sky Queen replied coldly in the Trade Language; she was watching people of all different races come and go around them. The gaggle of journalists and paparazzi were still crowding them; held at bay by security, who were eager to get the VIP out of here.

‘My apologies, Majesty,’ the aide began again, clearing her head. ‘My name is Saa, at your service,’ she added, as she led her guests away. ‘...I thought we might begin your visit with a flying tour of the city? The Gardens of Light look quite magnificent from the air at this time of year,’ she said with a smile. ‘Afterwards I could show you to your penthouse, and give you time to rest and settle in, before we begin any official meetings.’

‘...Penthouse?’ said Tabitha, suddenly rapt; trying to hide it.

‘Certainly,’ Saa replied politely. ‘Would you care to inspect the suite’s amenities, Majesty, to make sure they’re adequate for your stay?’

Hell yes I’d like to inspect the suite’s amenities, Tabitha told herself eagerly. I’d like to inspect the bathing amenities and live inside them for the next two bloody weeks.

‘Very well,’ Tabitha replied coolly.

The Ministry aide was nice enough, thought Tabitha, as her retainers followed her through the spaceport. Still, this bright place was a total assault on the senses, and she could only wonder what her three friends made of it all. She’d warned them before they’d set off in the Ministry shuttle; warned them about flight and space travel, and what insanity they might expect, and asked them if they were sure they really wanted to go with her. All three replied that they were sworn to their queen for life. That wherever she went, they’d follow.

Everything here in the spaceport was far too clean. Gigantic walls and floors, light and uniform and disinfected; heavenly-smooth as marble. An otherworldly woman walking by wore expensive perfume. Not a lot, and not vastly different to any perfume back on Old Earth, but now the forgotten smell was sickly-sweet and overpowering. Tabitha found herself slowing a little, walking closer to her retainers behind her, as Saa led them through this strange smooth place. Tabitha tried to fill her nose and her head with her tribe’s smells. Sweat. Breath. Soil and stone and fur. The faint meaty smell of necklace thread, cut and rolled from deer sinew. The woodsmoke scent of the hearthfire in her hair. Real smells, like home.

After a polite struggle through the crowd of reporters in the cavernous main lobby, Tabitha and her retainers were escorted outside onto a grand ornate walkway. Waiting for them at the end was some kind of aircar, long and striking, like some divine hovering limo.

‘Hey, are you alright?’ Tabitha asked Deep Roots quietly. He looked too spooked even to glance at the towering supercity all around them. He only nodded, subdued, and walked on beside her with quiet resolve. Sea Mist seemed equally muted at all the strange sights and sounds. Barkless wore an awestruck grin from ear to ear, and couldn’t decide where to stare first. All around them stood a colossal white heaven of green-gardened superstructures, latticed and sweeping in their designs; threaded by countless streams of elegant flying cars in a bright blue summer sky.

‘You can always go home mate, if you want to,’ Tabitha told Deep Roots in quiet concern, taking him aside as Saa motioned the others into the limosine. ‘It’s a lot to take in here. There’s no shame in it.’ Deep Roots just shook his head.

‘I, protect you,’ he said gruffly, with stone-solid conviction, in what little Trade Language he knew. ‘I, follow you, always.’ Tabitha smiled widely, and took a firm hold of his shoulder.

‘Come on then,’ she replied gently, leading him to the aircar with Sea Mist. ‘It’ll be fine.’ The car’s ornate door slid shut behind them as they took their plush leather seats inside. Tabitha felt her stomach dip as the limousine lifted away to join the flying traffic. Barkless laughed wholeheartedly at the sensation of flight, much to Saa’s amusement; Sea Mist was quiet and still. Tabitha glanced at Deep Roots in concern; his rough old hands gripped the seat hard with a tense scrunching creak.

‘Your Majesty. Honoured guests. Welcome to Serenity, the capital of the Interworld Ministry,’ Saa said warmly, formally, as the lines of traffic angled skywards and her guests caught sight of the full city view. Tabitha gawped from the window at a sprawling space-age masterpiece. Countless white skyscrapers, hung with multi-storey gardens, towered over spiderwebs of light in the streets and venues far below. Utopian monuments and cathedrals of science dotted the city skyline, wreathed in endless streams of flying traffic. Beyond it all lay hazy hills and a gleaming golden coast. Whispy summer clouds in the tidal blue.

‘This is Capital City, the spiritual home of the Ministry,’ said Saa, as she motioned to the changing view outside the windows. She watched her guests with satisfaction as they stared in silence, astonished that any place could be built so big; so bright. Their limosine slowed and banked away from the floating guide lights along the main highway.

‘So. Tell me more about this Ministry,’ said Tabitha, with a conscious effort to sound more regal and assertive.

‘Certainly,’ Saa replied happily, as the limousine climbed away to give them the full royal view. Up here the summer sky looked powder-pale like frosted glass; a zesty golden haze glowed through this towering urban afterlife. Sea Mist and Barkless were transfixed.

‘To understand the Ministry, one must understand Serenity,’ Saa explained, moving her bright-skinned hands as she spoke. ‘The ancient Serenians were as warlike as any other race. But their early empires wiped out entire religions, and replaced them with devout philosophy,’ she said. ‘Reason and logic became their gods. Faith, their gravest sin.’ The windows darkened and became overlaid with scrolling holograms. Tabitha glanced at her retainers as they watched the violent images of antiquity in silent fascination; trying to touch them. Watching cave art evolve into hieroglyphs, runes and frescoes, void of divinity.

‘So there’s been no religion here for thousands of years?’ said Tabitha.

‘That’s correct, Majesty,’ Saa replied. ‘Historic wars between Serenity’s nations eradicated new faiths, to maintain reason and free thought. A global culture of industry and philanthropy developed long before any other known race. Revering science, philosophy and technology above all else.’ Saa motioned to the windows, showing Tabitha a vast ancient sculpture in the green heart of the city. The stone monument was packed with dynamic forms of people hard at work. Gorgeous techno-deities and man-made saints, working ancient production lines in classical forms. Worshipping their industrial revolution, when Earth was still praying to Zeus.

‘Serenity’s Industrial Age culminated in superfusion, and the dawn of space travel,’ Saa continued. ‘After centuries of planetary discovery, and several unintended conflicts, the Interworld Ministry has established peace between worlds, and united over one hundred billion citizens, spanning twenty-two known races. With the addition of Stormworld’s voice on the council, the Ministry hopes to make that twenty-four. Counting both yourself and your tribe, of course.’

‘And the Ministry was all Serenity’s idea?’ said Tabitha, as they soared on over the city. Down below, every street was pristine. The architecture, divine. Not the slightest hint of crime or social struggle. In a word, wealth. ‘The Ministry is Serenity’s empire, isn’t it?’ she said.

‘Oh no, not an empire, Majesty,’ Saa corrected her pleasantly. ‘The Ministry merely governs and protects a union of free worlds, with Serenity as its spiritual home.’

Of course it does, Tabitha told herself cynically, watching unlimited wealth and prosperity rolling by outside. Things began to make sense. These genteel peoples, their delicate sensibilities and high mercurial fashion... and the gorgeous statued gods of progress, that held up every gleaming colossal building... Serenity’s pioneers had worked tirelessly to ensure endless wealth flowed back to their world, from all across this galaxy. She’d already seen what such enterprising prospectors were capable of, back on Stormworld... whether they really were lawless mercenaries, or secretly employed by the Ministry to get the job done. All that untouched wealth just waiting to be mined, and with those native tribes sitting inconveniently on top of it. She wondered if the other free worlds under the Ministry enjoyed their union quite so much as Serenity. Wondering if they saw much of their own wealth at all... and if there was anything they could even do about it.

‘Majesty?’ said Saa politely, breaking the silence between them.

‘Sorry, I was just... lost in the view,’ Tabitha replied pleasantly, keeping her darkening thoughts to herself. ‘What’s that?’ she said, pointing to a stunning white spire among the passing skyscrapers.

‘I believe that’s the Platinum Room, Your Majesty,’ Saa replied.

‘A bar?’ said Tabitha, watching the elegant rooftop party below.

‘In one sense,’ Saa replied cryptically. ‘It’s a kind of focal point for art, philosophy and celebrity. A temple for ideas, if you will. It’s a popular type of venue across the central worlds.’

‘I’m intrigued,’ Tabitha replied, putting on a smile.

Saa called ahead from the limo to grant her guests VIP access before they landed down. Tabitha had to leave her bewildered friends outside by the car pad, when she saw Deep Roots’ clear discomfort at the strange busy venue.

‘Look after him, ok? Sit with him, by the trees there,’ Tabitha signed to Sea Mist in concern. She had to leave her three Stormians in the ornate aerial gardens, as she headed inside with Saa. ‘I’ll be back soon, ok?’ she called to them. Saddened to leave her friends worried outside.

It was bizarre to hear music again, after so long without it; some kind of churning sherbet-fizzy synth, like nothing she’d ever heard before. It sounded like alien deep house, upbeat and supercool, to match the strange beautiful creatures milling around this white-lit palace bar. Everyone she passed smelled amazing; looked amazing. Not just in the wealth of their clothes and strange perfumes but in their vibrant varied skin, or scales, or fur; their glossy hair or bright fins. They were super-healthy, and thriving; it was a look in their shining eyes and gracious smiles as she passed by. Nutrition was their religion. The statues around the place looked brand new; reflecting this culture like stone-figure mirrors. These peoples saw themselves as the masterpieces; they were their own gods. Was that vanity, or the peak of self-development? Was this what Earth could have become, given a couple more centuries of peace? It’d been so long since she’d really thought about home. Had she even thought of it at all? It was harder to think about it now, with all that guilt in the way. She’d left her own race to its extinction. What kind of person did that make her? What kind of leader?

What the hell am I doing here, calling myself a queen? Tabitha pulled herself from her thoughts; checking around to see if anyone had noticed her staring into a corner. She’d left Earth. Right or wrong, that’s how it was. The fact remained that she was a leader now, and she absolutely had Stormworld’s best interests in mind. She might not have been able to save Earth, but she could save Stormworld. The Ministry weren’t the Watchers, but they wanted the same thing. Empire. Control. She wasn’t going to let history repeat itself. She refused to let that happen to another world.

‘Majesty?’ said Saa, watching her with concern. ‘Is something wrong?’

‘No, thank you,’ Tabitha replied, as pleasantly and regally as she could. ‘I’d like to meet some people here, if you wouldn’t mind introducing me?’

‘Of course,’ Saa said happily. ‘Right this way.’

After all, that’s what I’m here for, Tabitha told herself, as she followed Saa through the palatial lounge. She’d come to Serenity for one reason above all else. Know your enemy.

The architecture in here was something else. The monumental ceiling was seamless, like one vast sky of white angular stone. Its sheer relief trenches, lit in all the right places, made a single colossal sunburst of deep shadows and luminous highlights. Off from the main space were twilight galleries of galactic antiquities; many of the spotlit exhibits more ancient than humanity itself. Wealth beyond counting populated the pristine bar; elegant figures sipped rare wines and spirits forged and filtered on forgotten worlds, orbiting distant dying suns.

‘So glad you’re here,’ purred a tall thin stunning creature, smiling to Tabitha lovingly as she passed by.

‘Me too,’ Tabitha replied quietly, uncertain if she should know the glamorous figure already. The being’s clothes changed colour at a touch when she passed it by; high fashion that blushed dust-bright and shifted chameleonic.

Tabitha wandered the venue like an awestruck child, with Saa smiling and grounded beside her as she made some introductions. The endless variety of peoples enjoying the space was a neverending chaos of colourful skin and striking ethereal fashion. Chatting groups surrounded a wide bright fountain. Passing them by, Tabitha caught a snatch of artistic debate here; an impassioned existential speech there. These weren’t people worrying about the success of their next hunt, or the dryness of firewood. The whole place looked like some art-gallery temple on silver psychedelics. All of it bounded and framed by pristine white pillars, and the shining daylight spilling through in between. It looked like heaven here, and everywhere stood the gorgeous statues that made up the city’s house style; flawless techno-deities, staring blank-eyed and fearless into the future. Wreathed in ornate wheels and halos like flowing celestial rings. Man-made gods of progress.

‘Ah, the fabled Queen of the Heavens,’ said a tall graceful creature with a smooth rich voice, bowing to Tabitha as he approached. ‘It is as they say, Majesty. You are, indeed, a primal angel.’

‘Hm?’ Tabitha replied cluelessly, turning absently to the gorgeous tanned figure. Some slender-delicate master of ceremonies, adorned in a flawless flowing suit, collared and caped in grand lightning-bolt ribbons.

‘I am honoured to meet the warrior-sovereign of Stormworld,’ he told her happily, almost mystically; bowing again. Holding her gaze with dark speckled eyes, deep and starred like twin galaxies. ‘Tales of your people’s struggle are a true inspiration,’ he said, as he stepped closer. ‘But do tread carefully in our Ministers’ hallowed halls, won’t you,’ he said quietly, with no small hint of sarcasm as he edged politely by. ‘Our leading lights shine so brilliantly. And cast such black shadows.’

‘I see?’ Tabitha replied uncertainly, in an equally hushed tone, as she watched him walk away. Glancing around, people were staring subtly at her and her recent company.

‘It feels... political, here,’ Tabitha told Saa quietly, as she sipped her drink and smiled to a bowing couple.

‘It is certainly that, Majesty,’ Saa replied quietly, almost under her breath. ‘Might I recommend a walk in the gardens?’ she added, in a clearer tone. Tabitha noted the look in Saa’s calm blue eyes and saw just what she was getting at. I hope you like the pretty nest. Shall we move on, before the vipers find us?

42

‘Welcome home,’ Saa told her guests happily, as she opened the doors on a striking penthouse suite. Gigantic lounge bar, gleaming space-age kitchen, floor-to-ceiling windows with a sprawling park view... the place was ridiculous. Tabitha felt like she’d wandered into a dream.

‘Would you like me to show you around?’ said Saa. She turned in sudden shock as Sea Mist somehow splattered the kitchen with bright green smoothie, from an expensive-looking appliance.

‘No, thank you,’ Tabitha replied pleasantly, with an awkward smile. ‘We’ll... work it out.’

‘You can use the screen by the door here to have a drone come and clean that up for you,’ Saa told her kindly, glancing at Sea Mist in the kitchen as she licked smoothie off the wall. ‘I’ll... leave you to relax and settle in,’ Saa added. ‘The apartment’s artificial intelligence can help with anything you need, so just ask,’ she said, as she headed for the door. ‘Oh, just one more thing, Majesty. That wristcom you’re wearing... I assume it belonged to one of the mercenary fighters, from the conflict?’

‘That’s right,’ Tabitha replied, thinking back to the horrifying remains where she’d found the device. ‘...You need to take it?’

‘I’m afraid so, Majesty,’ Saa said apologetically. ‘Our Guardian police are required to treat it as evidence, as part of the mercenaries’ criminal trials. But I have a replacement wristcom for you, right here,’ she said pleasantly, pulling a much more expensive-looking device from her jacket pocket.

‘There’s some translation software on here though,’ Tabitha explained, as she pulled the tablet sleeve off her wrist. ‘It’s tailored to me.’

‘Ah, that’s not a problem, Majesty,’ Saa replied with a smile, as she swapped her a new earpiece too. ‘I’ll sync your data to this new one right now.’ Saa tapped rapidly on the small screen. She waited a moment while the two devices blinked light to each other, and it was done. ‘That’s all transferred over for you, Majesty. You shouldn’t have any problems. But please, get right in touch if you do,’ she said warmly, handing her the bright new wristcom.

‘Thank you,’ Tabitha replied, smiling. Hiding her suspicion. They’re very eager to take that old one off me.

‘Of course, Majesty. I’m glad to be of help,’ said Saa happily, as she pocketed the beaten older device. ‘I’ll be in touch tomorrow morning. Until then, it was my absolute pleasure to meet with you all. Welcome to Serenity.’ Smiling, Saa bowed politely and left them to stare around their dazzling new home.

Tabitha pulled off her furs and catsuit in the palatial white bathroom. She dropped her rattling beads and bones by the giant sink, and studied herself in the colossal mirror. Even just seeing her full reflection again was a novelty; she looked leaner and harder than she remembered. Grimy too; she could see the grey dirt in her pores. The smudged tidemark browns of soil and rain on her skin. The rosy peach glow of her snow-tanned arms and face, against her pale chest. Suddenly she could smell the damp sour reek of her clothes, really smell them; clashing with the perfumed bubbles in the running hot tub behind her. She hadn’t noticed the stink until now.

‘Would you like these clothes laundered, Majesty?’ said a strange formal voice. Tabitha jumped in shock and flicked her claws out instinctively, crouching there in her birthday suit and ready to attack. There wasn’t anyone here.

‘...Who’s there?’ she asked the bathroom, wary and confused.

‘I am your suite’s personal artificial intelligence,’ the voice replied, smooth and androgynous. ‘I can manage your household and take care of anything you require.’ Why did it sound like a butler?

‘Why do you sound like a butler?’ Tabitha asked the ceiling.

‘Because I am the software equivalent of a butler,’ the AI replied.

‘Oh,’ said Tabitha.

‘You will find a bathrobe hanging just beside the door if you prefer, Your Majesty,’ the AI offered.

‘...Naked’s fine,’ Tabitha replied defensively.

‘As you wish, Your Majesty.’

‘It’s ok, isn’t it? ...Naked?’ she said curiously, glancing at herself in the mirror.

‘You appear to be in peak health, Majesty.’

‘...Sexy?’ Tabitha tried.

‘I’m sorry Majesty?’

‘Peak health and ...sexy? Or not sexy?’

‘I’m afraid I lack the programming to comment on physical attractiveness, Your Majesty.’

‘It’s purely a body confidence thing,’ Tabitha assured it casually. ‘I’m... just looking for a simple positive affirmation. To enhance my mood and outlook for the day,’ she tried.

‘...Would you like me to say that you look sexy, Majesty?’ said the AI, neutrally.

‘Little bit,’ Tabitha mumbled, studying her reflection.

‘You look very sexy, Your Majesty.’

‘Oh you,’ she replied, grinning. ‘I love it when you give me spontaneous compliments like that.’

‘Yes, Your Majesty.’

‘So... did you say you can clean my clothes for me?’

‘Certainly,’ it replied, calm and polite. A small elegant robot hovered from an opening panel in the wall, scooped up her clothes, and was gone again. ‘I’ll have those cleaned for you by the time you’ve finished your bath, Majesty,’ said the AI.

‘What if I have a really quick bath? Like, two seconds?’ she asked it.

‘Instantaneous garment-optimised aqueous polymer filtration takes approximately point ninth of a second to complete,’ the AI replied.

‘Well... alright then,’ Tabitha replied, as if she’d let the AI off the hook. ‘Just be careful with that catsuit.’

‘A preliminary scan showed that your bioengineered environment-responsive bodysuit is composed of an extremely durable intelligent cellular weave,’ the AI assured her. ‘It was not damaged during the cleaning process.’

‘You’ve cleaned it already?’ Tabitha said in surprise.

‘Yes, Your Majesty. Instantaneous garment-optimised aqueous polymer filtration takes approximately point ninth of–

‘Oh yeah, yeah. I forgot about that,’ Tabitha interrupted, feeling decidedly more stupid than when she’d entered the room. ‘I’ll just... get in the bath now.’

‘Enjoy your bathing experience,’ said the AI, warm and upbeat, with a smile in its voice.

‘Er, thanks,’ Tabitha replied, cringing inside. ‘You can... leave the room now. Please.’

‘I understand, Your Majesty,’ the AI replied, a little slow and condescending. The service drone reappeared and set her clothes out, neatly hung and freshly laundered, and vanished again through a soft gliding panel in the wall. The AI gave her a cursory, premium-sounding boop to assure her that it’d gone.

‘Thank you, for cleaning my clothes,’ Tabitha called after it, talking to the ceiling. No reply. Strange as it all was, she could get used to this. For the couple of days she was here, anyway. Smiling widely at the prospect, she stepped into the huge hot bubble bath and sank down stiffly, with the mother of all contented sighs. She’d died and gone to home-comfort heaven. Soap-scented bath bubbles poppled fizzily by her ears as she lay back in the hot water. She felt the ache of ages loosening from her stiff muscles, and resolved never to leave this water for the rest of her life. Henceforth she would be Tabathor, Queen of Bubbles.

‘Um... AI?’ she asked the ceiling. No reply. ‘...AI?’

‘Yes your Majesty?’ it replied, its voice growing, as if it was coming in from another room.

‘Does this bath have bubble jets?’ she asked it hopefully.

‘Certainly,’ the voice replied. Suddenly bubble jets massaged her muscles gloriously. ‘Would you like me to read you the full hydrotherapy menu, Your Majesty?’

‘That’s the single greatest thing anyone’s ever said to me,’ Tabitha sighed contentedly, closing her eyes.

‘I’m sorry Majesty?’

‘Yes please,’ she said with a smile, sinking down in the steamy water. She made a croaking purr of pleasure; wrapped and softening in the floating perfumed heat.

A little while later Tabitha woke to find herself in a big hot bubble bath on a futuristic alien world. As you do.

‘Did you enjoy your nap, Majesty?’ said the AI, sculpting its audio to sound like it was returning into the room.

‘Mm,’ Tabitha replied contentedly.

‘On a cultural note, on Serenity it is customary to wear undergarments, Majesty,’ the AI advised.

‘I’m aware of the concept of underwear, thank you,’ Tabitha replied haughtily. ‘I lost my underwear in an alien abduction, if it’s all the same to you.’ She tried not to think about the Watchers’ ship, and that dark starving horror she’d been fed to. It was in her dreams often enough.

‘I apologise for causing offence, your Majesty,’ the AI replied. ‘Would you like to shop for some new underwear?’ Part of the white wall at the foot of the bath faded up into a screen, presenting a range of high-end underwear in an online store. Tailored for a variety of species, in more brands than she could count.

‘Hmm,’ Tabitha replied contentedly, studying the giant screen. ‘Could you pick out a few that’d be best? Can you do that?’

‘Certainly, Majesty,’ the AI replied. ‘I will shortlist ten matching sets based on current trends and your assumed preferences, and have them delivered to–

‘And maybe... make me a cocktail of something?’ she cut in.

‘Of course,’ it replied. An appliance appeared in the wall beside her, presenting a glass of something heady and chilled.

‘And warm the floor, for when I get out?’ she tried.

‘That will happen automatically, Majesty.’

‘Can you shave my legs for me?’

‘Your bath can remove any body hair you prefer via microvibrasion, Majesty.’

‘Can I have some candles please?’

‘I can simulate candle flames on the walls around you,’ the AI replied.

‘And bring the bathrobe closer?’ she added, grinning. The AI didn’t seem like it was going to break. Not yet. There’s time.

‘Certainly, Majesty,’ it replied, as the hovering drone appeared to bring the bathrobe from the wall.

‘Does it come in polka dot?’ she said. The bathrobe’s soft fabric blushed dark blue and grew polka dots.

‘Play some relaxing music,’ she ordered it. Music filled the bathroom. ‘More relaxing,’ Tabitha tried. The AI obeyed. ‘Not that relaxing.’ It modified the music again. ‘Now go away.’ It obeyed with a polite shrinking tone. The AI dimmed the bathroom to candlelight flickers, as Tabitha sipped her cocktail and shopped for new knickers.

Down the corridor in the lounge, the Sky Queen’s retainers sat around on the hard floor beside the sofas; pondering the bizarre exchange they’d just overheard down the passageway. Barkless Tree was lost in thought over it. Sea Mist wondered why Dark Storm should be so ashamed of her body, that she would bathe in a closed chamber away from them. Deep Roots sat silently beside them, staring through the giant windows as he pondered the sounds of the ghostly exchange. The Sky Queen had been talking to a voice with no body. There was no one in that chamber with her; he was sure of it. Just a ghostly voice to do her bidding, when she’d never let anyone do anything for her before. Something about this strange palace was bringing out another side of her; a spoiled side. Stealing her pride and making her soft. Lowering her. Bad magic. He looked again out of the flat-glass walls, and tried to ignore how warm it was here. Too warm; heavy-warm. This was a smooth, dead, haunted land, with ghosts and demons in its walls. All the giant stone trees out there – or were they thin narrow mountains? – had lots of home caves each. But the caves weren’t part of the land, and they were too straight. Too much the same. They removed these peoples from the land. Had his new daughter Dark Storm come from this horrible place? These poor strange people had no connection to the wild world, or the water or food, or soil or sky. How could they ever get to feel the rain and wind and snow on their bodies, hidden away like this? How could they ever live strong and challenged and contented here, in the teachings of Fierce-Hope? There weren’t even hearthfires here, to gather around together; where were their tribes? He hadn’t seen one. All these people, more people than he’d ever seen or thought possible... they were tribeless, and alone, and afraid, and only took from the world and pushed it back to the edges, out of their busy frantic way. They weren’t in balance here, and they weren’t at peace. It showed in how they talked and smelled and dressed and bathed, and lived and ate and ignored each other on the straight stone paths of their world.

Deep Roots sat in silence, lost and troubled. He tried to ask the spirit land and First Ancestor if he should work to spread Fierce-Hope, in this strange place beyond the stars, for these lost sorry spirits. But there was no ground here to sit with; nothing living and growing in this shiny cave to hold and breathe and pray through. Deep Roots breathed heavily in his tense frustration, and wiped the heartbroken tears from his eyes before Sea Mist and Barkless could see the old fool cry. What would happen to his daughter Deer in this dead haunted land, and how could he ever hope to protect her from it? What would become of great Dark Storm, his child, his proud fierce queen?

‘Hi guys,’ Tabitha said brightly, reappearing from the bathroom rosy-cheeked and smiling. All three of her retainers stood up, looking strangely grim and formal. Watching her in pained silence. ‘...Is something wrong?’ she said.

‘Worry,’ Deep Roots said gruffly, the weight of the world on his old shoulders, trying to get his mouth around the Trade Language. ‘Bad magic, here. Make you, soft.’

‘What are you talking about?’ Tabitha replied happily, draining her cocktail. ‘It’s just a different way of living, that’s all,’ she assured him. ‘It’s only for a few days, then we’ll go home,’ she added. ‘Why don’t you go and try a bubble bath? You’ll love it,’ she said with a grin. Searching the kitchen for more booze.

‘Wrong, way,’ Deep Roots replied sternly, emphatically; clearly frustrated as he searched for the words. ‘Wrong! ...Soft!’ his eyes were shining with tears; he was breathing heavily in obvious distress. He beat his old chest, to feel the hurt in his heart. ‘Not queen here! Not strong! Not, proud!’ Sea Mist and Barkless grunted their agreement; all three of them looked deeply concerned.

‘Hey,’ Tabitha said tenderly, coming over to them. ‘I’m sorry... I never meant to make you upset,’ she said gently, putting a hand on Deep Roots’ shoulder.

‘Not, upset,’ he snapped gruffly, stepping away from her hand. ‘Protect, you. Truth.’

‘...I don’t understand,’ Tabitha replied, shaking her head.

‘Wrong, here,’ said Sea Mist, nodding. ‘Bad.’ Tabitha looked at her in concern. Sea Mist was usually so quiet that she listened carefully to every word she had to say. She wouldn’t have said anything unless this was really bothering her. Especially if she was prepared to say it in the new alien Trade Language. ‘You, not, proud, here. Not, strong.’

‘Barkless?’ Tabitha tried, searching his eyes. The progressive one of her three. The most open-minded in Sky Tribe.

‘Wrong, here,’ he told her, nodding thoughtfully. ‘No Fierce-Hope.’ Barkless Tree never seemed to agree with anyone normally. In fact he seemed to enjoy going out of his way to disagree and contradict. If he was saying the same thing though...

‘Ok. We’ll leave here,’ Tabitha told them with sudden concern, setting her glass down. ‘Thank you for telling me.’ She clutched the bones and beads hung around her neck, and noticed how wrong her catsuit and furs smelled now that they’d been cleaned. They didn’t smell of their smell.

‘We, protect, you,’ Sea Mist told her. Deep Roots wiped his eyes and smiled, and put a hard heavy hand on her shoulder.

‘You, Sky Queen. Name. War. Proud. Ancient Way,’ he told her, struggling to express his thoughts in the alien tongue. Tempted as he was to take out a chalk and draw what he meant, he resisted. He refused to sully the sacred painted words with these smooth unnatural surfaces.

‘Ancient Way,’ Tabitha replied, smiling. ‘Come on. We’ll find somewhere else to stay. Somewhere with dirt.’

‘Good,’ Deep Roots chuckled happily, as he escorted her out. Wiping his tears as his tired old face creased into a grin. ‘Good.’

Tabitha’s retainers were infinitely happier with their new accommodation. Granted, to most people it was a public park in a gleaming supercity; glowing skyscrapers towered around them in the night. For her friends though, it meant the world. It was as close to the good raw wild as they were going to get. Tabitha smiled as she listened to them scratching and snoring where they lay on the grass, and tried to remember the feeling of her hot bath. Maybe they were right though. It’d taken going through hell and back to knock the softness out of her. She was the Sky Queen, after all. She had a duty to her people. The more she thought about it, lying back in a hot bubblebath with a cocktail in her hand, and robot slaves to do her bidding... it felt like a total betrayal of what her people stood for. Everything they’d fought and died for; their way of life. Had any of them witnessed it, they might never follow her again. Her friends had been right to confront her about it. At least if she wanted to continue leading them, anyway.

Unless... did she want to lead them? Did she have the right? Or was it better to leave them alone to lead themselves, like they always had? She had the chance of a new life here on this world. Maybe this was the kind of planet she’d been looking for all along. Like Earth before everything happened, only better. She was living in the future here, bright and exciting. A far cry from the blood and dirt of Stormworld... and the ashes of Earth. She didn’t need to be the Sky Queen here; she didn’t even need to be Tabitha any more. She could be anyone she wanted. Do anything she wanted. Disappear from Stormworld, and start a new life. She was a survivor. She changed; adapted. Constantly. Maybe it was time to adapt again. She’d seen enough suffering. What did she owe anyone, anyway?...

How dare you, she scolded herself. How dare you take those people’s trust and faith, and drop it whenever it suits you. How dare you even think like that, and betray your fucking tribe. Tabitha sat in silence and looked up at the stars, wondering what Liv and Will would make of everything. Trying to think what they would do. Except... I don’t need to think about it, because I already know. I’m a Ghost. It’s what a Ghost should do.

Glinting eyes stalked her in the dark; she couldn’t tell where. The leaf-rustling footsteps were all around her. Panicked, breathless, Tabitha felt like she was drowning in the closing forest. Some dark massive shape threw her down from behind and ate her alive. Tabitha woke screaming; traumatised at the memories. Staring at a soft-lit park on a strange world, in the middle of the night. She jumped at a sudden hand on her shoulder.

‘Sleep easy, my sister. Sleep deep,’ Sea Mist told her softly in Stormish, reciting the dreamless chant.

‘What are you saying?’ Tabitha whispered, fascinated to know. But Sea Mist just shook her head, and motioned to her, to lay back down by the fire.

‘The night is the death time, yes you know. But there’ll be no danger tonight,’ Sea Mist continued in Stormish. Watching over her, as the red-mane stared at the flames with tired eyes, and drifted off to sleep. ‘Sleep easy, my sister, sleep deep, and I’ll keep watch in the dark,’ Sea Mist finished gently. ‘Take all my Fierce-Hope for your own.’

‘Your Majesty, I’ve been looking for you,’ said Saa the next morning, waiting expectantly in the grand lobby of the apartment building. ‘How did you find the penthouse suite?’ Tabitha’s aide quickly looked her up and down, and wondered why she was covered in bits of grass.

‘We... preferred to sleep outdoors,’ Tabitha replied pleasantly. Saa looked at her curiously, and smiled.

‘Hey!’ said an important-looking man, dressed head to toe in expensive running gear. He was staring indignantly from across the lobby, and marched straight to the alien receptionist behind the vast desk. ‘Those are the ones who were cutting down branches in the park! They were burning them on the lawns!’

‘Do you know a better way to build a fire?’ Tabitha called back. Instantly Saa looked tense.

‘Build a fire!?’ the man replied in horror, storming over, as if it was some primitive alien concept. ‘Why the hell are you building a fire!? Hm!?’ He was coming much too close. Deep Roots gripped him by the throat and put him on the floor, snarling right in his terrified face.

‘No.’ Deep Roots growled at him, holding him there. The man looked frozen; afraid for his life.

‘Let him go,’ Tabitha commanded. Deep Roots stepped back and watched the strange man scuttle away and get to his feet. Snarling, Sea Mist reached for her knife. Saa stepped in before things got any more tense.

‘I’m sure this gentleman didn’t mean Her Majesty any harm,’ Saa said agreeably. The receptionist was staring from the desk. ‘Could we reach a compromise? Please?’ Saa tried. ‘I’ll arrange for any more firewood to be pre-supplied to my guests’ spot in the park, so that the ornamental trees remain unharmed,’ she said, looking for some sign of agreement in the man’s offended stare. ‘In an approved fire-safe area, of course,’ she added pleasantly. The man still stared furiously.

‘There’s no way in hell I’ll allow these people to start lighting more fires in–

‘Unless, of course, you would prefer to make this a matter for the courts?’ Saa interrupted. Her friendly gaze and pleasant smile put a sharp, silent threat in the man’s mind. By all means, take this to a Ministry justice. Let’s see who wins. Lost for words in all his quiet well-bred rage, the man broke into alien muttering in his native tongue and stormed past them for the ornate elevators.

‘Let’s... leave it at that,’ Saa said brightly, leading her guests through the lobby and onto the street.

‘Thank you, for that,’ Tabitha replied candidly, smiling with relief.

‘Of course, Majesty,’ said Saa, with a happy tone. Leading them on down the scenic avenue. ‘I thought we might take a short walking tour of the city today, to help get your bearings? The weather should be perfect today.’ The sun climbed lemon-yellow in a bright sky over the bay. A group of well-dressed tourists passed by across the pristine boulevard.

‘Enemies?’ said Sea Mist gruffly, her hand hovering at the glass knife on her belt.

‘Oh no, there are no enemies. I assure you,’ Saa replied nervously.

‘It’s fine,’ Tabitha told her tribe-sister gently. ‘Trust me.’ Sea Mist grunted her satisfaction at that, and walked on at Tabitha’s side. Her eyes flicking around at the buildings constantly for any sign of threats or predators. Tabitha glanced at her warily.

For the love of god, please don’t stab anyone.

Ambling through a quiet residential quarter, while Saa provided a polite commentary of tourist information, Tabitha looked around at a city designed to perfection. Every few streets had a college or museum tucked away, or hybrid sports bars and theatres. Further on, boutique stores and restful parks nestled in the urban sprawl. It felt more like a network of compact villages than one giant super-city; every scenic square and lively market was walled off cosily by a dozen homes and venues.

Saa led them on down sunlit avenues to a small aircar station, where the floating limousine was waiting. Tabitha glanced around for the source of growing chatter among the bystanders... until she realised that they were muttering about her. She suddenly felt shy at all this attention; all the waves and hellos. Lots of people held up their wristcoms to video the scene as she boarded the elegant limo.

‘Majesty,’ said the familiar driver, nodding in the rear-view mirror as they climbed in.

‘Hello again,’ Tabitha replied happily.

‘Ok,’ Saa said brightly, once everyone was inside. ‘The industry quarter, please.’

‘I thought it would make sense to continue your tour here, Majesty,’ said Saa, as they flew over a vast landscape of domed power plants and vapour chimneys. ‘Everything the Ministry has accomplished, between so many worlds, stems from our use of fusion power.’

Fascinating, Tabitha told herself, with a mental sigh. But, she was a leader now. She’d have to practice feigning interest. A lot.

‘The use of high-efficiency fusion power gives Serenity and the Ministry near-unlimited energy,’ Saa explained. ‘It powers our homes, our cities, those cargo starships you see in the distance... even this car.’

‘As in... nuclear fusion?’ said Tabitha. ‘We’re riding in a nuclear car?’

‘Please don’t worry Majesty, we’re completely safe,’ Saa chuckled politely. ‘It’s thanks to this fusion power that the Ministry has no insatiable appetite for fuels, or wars of resource, which have plagued so many civilisations in the past,’ she continued pleasantly. ‘We only seek to expand our influence to new worlds, like your own, for the betterment of all intelligent life. The Ministry merely strives to promote freedom, knowledge and greater qualities of life. Through peace, unity and scientific endeavour.’

‘It’s... an impressive cause,’ Tabitha admitted, deep in thought. ‘I can’t imagine how much time and effort must be invested in making it all work, across all those different worlds. Even just day to day.’

‘The expert collaboration of billions, Majesty, indeed,’ Saa said agreeably. ‘Hours of planning and hard work beyond counting.’

‘And all this advanced technology, just to make it possible,’ Tabitha wondered, with a look of awe. Glancing around the car’s interior. ‘All of it connected, and integrated...’

‘Indeed, Majesty,’ Saa replied happily; glad that she was taking such an interest. ‘Miles of connections run through the average home, or building. To say nothing of the millions of service drones we need to keep every city running smoothly.’

‘And the sheer amount of circuits and precious metals, running through all of it,’ Tabitha added, innocently. ‘The Ministry’s demand for gold and silver must be... astronomical.’ She looked back from the rolling industrial view, and calmly met Saa’s gaze. Watching for her reaction.

‘Absolutely, Majesty,’ Saa agreed sincerely, giving nothing away. The woman didn’t try to change the subject; she just continued to explain the Ministry’s endless workings. Tabitha searched Saa’s pleasant blue gaze. Trying to see if that mind was concealing something about the Ministry, and Stormworld’s gold-grabbing invaders. Looking for a lie.

43

Tabitha dwelled on the question. Had Saa known anything about Stormworld’s invasion? ...Would it matter if she had? Her aide didn’t have that kind of power. She had to reach the ones who did. But for now, she couldn’t afford to be so blunt about it. That cryptic man was right, back in the beautiful high-rise bar. She’d have to tread much more carefully in this place. Far more useful to have a friend like Saa, than just another enemy.

The limo dropped them off by the city’s striking waterfront, and lifted away silently as they walked in the bright sunshine. Tabitha looked around and smiled at the vivid promenade, squinting in the light. The breeze blew fresh and gentle from an ultra-blue sea. She could smell the salt on it, just like home. The strong sun felt hot and glorious on her face. God, I’ve missed that feeling.

‘Shall we take a walk?’ Saa said pleasantly, leading the way.

‘Good,’ Deep Roots told Tabitha, ambling along beside her at an easy pace. He was smiling widely; breathing deep. The sea breeze ruffled his rough brown fur. He couldn’t take his eyes off the white-gold beach, where the clear waves shushed and broke and soaked into the sand. This place had a holiday feeling about it; a sunglow aquabliss.

‘Do you like it here mate?’ said Tabitha, smiling to him. It had to feel better than the built-up city centre.

‘Yes. Good,’ he replied with a grin, in what little Trade Language he knew.

‘Fire,’ Barkless said behind them, fanning his dark fur with his hand as they strolled on down the promenade.

‘You’re hot?’ Tabitha asked him.

‘Hm,’ he grunted, nodding. With that he vaulted over the ornate railing beside them and dropped to the beach, startling an alien couple, and ran off to jump in the sea. Tabitha heard Sea Mist chuckle softly beside her, watching him with a smile. When she noticed Tabitha glance at her curiously, her expression returned to its usual stony self.

‘You don’t have to be strong all the time,’ Tabitha told her gently, signing to her. Looking her sister in the eyes.

‘Ah. You should try this,’ Saa said brightly, leading them to a cafe booth on the pristine waterfront. She bought a round of icy drinks from the squat smiling barista, and invited her guests to try it.

‘Whoa,’ Tabitha mumbled, studying the glass once she’d taken a sip, then a gulp. It was cold, and extremely refreshing; more so than anything she’d ever tasted. Fresh, juicy, tropimanic slushiness. ‘How’s that so good?’

‘Nice, isn’t it?’ Saa agreed, watching their happy faces in satisfaction. ‘It’s a cocktail of Serenian tropical fruits, with purified mudcrawler juices.’

‘Hm?’ Tabitha replied, mid-mouthful, staring suddenly as she gulped it down. ‘Mudcrawler?...’

‘Juices,’ Saa finished, matter-of-factly. Juices sounded worse than juice. Juice came out of fruit. Juices came out of... things. ‘It’s extremely nutritious,’ Saa added.

‘Juices, though,’ Tabitha replied, still staring at the glass in horror. Granted, it was gorgeously tasty. And she had a gentle rush going on from all the nutrients in the stuff. But still.

‘Good,’ Sea Mist chipped in, drinking Barkless Tree’s glassful before he’d seen it from the beach.

They turned at a sudden scream on the sand. Running over to the railing, Tabitha watched a jogger running away from Barkless on the shore.

‘Stop chasing that woman!’ Tabitha commanded him. ‘I’m really sorry!’ she called after the jogger, who was too busy running for her life.

‘She, runs at me!’ Barkless called back in his defence.

‘She wasn’t going to attack you, she was running past!’ Tabitha replied, drawing a few curious glances from alien passers by. Barkless just shook his head and shrugged that he didn’t understand, as he walked back dripping up the beach.

‘Strange,’ he observed, as he hauled himself over the railing beside them. His new favourite word. He’d been saying it a lot since they’d arrived on Serenity. It told Tabitha just how much her retainers found weird and confusing about this world, which was practically everything. It couldn’t have been further from their own way of life.

Heading on down the length of the promenade, Saa led them off down a bright side alley of stores, onto a main high street that ran parallel. For a moment, Tabitha forgot all her stony suspicion of Saa and this world. Her jaw dropped just to see so much life here. It was bustling with every kind of being, in every kind of colour. A sleek sunlit utopia of trickling water and tree-lined pools; elaborate stores selling masterpieces in shapes and materials she’d never seen before. Over on her left a wealthy reptilian woman browsed the shop windows in utter bliss, while a small gang of drones and robots carted her countless bags behind her. On Tabitha’s right, they were passing the giant windows of a shining bistro. Couples and friends laughing and chattering over otherworldly meals in rainbow shades. Hologram adverts flickered to life as Saa and her guests walked by. Public art changed form and tone as they passed it; twisting and colourshifting in a velvetine powdertumble. Tabitha just wanted to stop for a while and take it all in; there was too much life and colour bustling past. The towering buildings beyond the high street were pearly white and vivid green in the sunlight; living plants cascaded down from balconies and rooftops. Living architecture, like a towering porcelain jungle.

‘This way,’ Saa said up ahead, smiling at their wondering faces. ‘The Academy.’ She led them through a great sweeping archway into a palatial mall-turned-cathedral. The lower walls were covered with gorgeous murals and psychedelic street art. Looking up, awestruck, Tabitha saw an angular white heaven painted in brilliant light. Tier after endless tier of sweeping walkways reached ever upwards; diners and shoppers like tiny specks up there, people-watching from high above. There were artists and designers at work in open studios; teachers and philosophers in small theatres, addressing rapt crowds. Alien kids playing deliriously in the fountains beside a family bar. Smooth unfolding music filled the giant space with a heavenly drone, climbing and pulsing and drifting out like waves in a gleaming afterlife.

‘You should come back here at night,’ Saa suggested, watching their awestruck faces.

‘Why?’ Tabitha mumbled, still staring up at the heavenly heights and blissful music.

‘It’s... kind of hard to put into words,’ Saa replied, smiling at the thought.

Their walking tour of the city was starting to feel like one big fairground ride. The shops and stalls in the next covered market were a candystripe colourstorm of everything Tabitha had never seen before. Every kind of creature around her in some bright white bazaar, croaking and laughing or arguing over prices. Tabitha watched an ornate robot hover past her down the next street; spiked and white and spinning around a bright gold heart. Another droid in the distance looked beaten and battered, clunking up the street behind a grumbling old man and carrying boxes of bizarre fruits.

‘This is one of our smaller markets,’ Saa explained, guiding them on through the bustling crowd.

‘Small?’ Tabitha replied dumbly, trying to keep up as she looked around in a daze. She found herself staring at the dropped food wrappers here and there; just anything normal and everyday to anchor to in this alien madness. She noticed the dropped children’s toy; the brave single weeds sprouting by wall corners as they passed. All rapidly cleaned away by hovering drones on patrol. The mess, the clutter, the realness, all hastily and constantly sanitised away.

Their next stop was a giant sweeping dome. Wandering inside, its roof was open wide in vast beamed petals, curving up to the blue summer sky. A calm, clinical church of progress.

‘Communes like this are dotted all over Serenity,’ Saa explained. ‘They’re a kind of self-contained academic village, where every member shares the same values and works to a common goal. Whether that’s promoting philosophy to the wider worlds, researching a cure for a particular disease, or developing new robotics, like the one we’re in now.’

‘This is amazing,’ Tabitha mumbled, gazing at the brilliant white curves of the space. They centred around a sunny green courtyard, practically a small park, where distant figures sat and talked on stone steps. High above on the circling upper tiers were sunlit apartments, arranged in angled terraces. Serviced by beautiful floating robots, like twisting abstract sculptures. The homes were all vast windows and clean sweeping lines, with latticed walls flowing down to labs and pooled gardens. Glancing at her retainers, Tabitha saw Barkless gawping at the scale of this village-cave with his mouth hanging open. Sea Mist and Deep Roots kept to their stoic selves. Suddenly some huge white horse of an animal came charging at them out of nowhere. Yelling in shock, Tabitha sprang her claws in self-defence and tore its head open with a crunch. Deep Roots pounced on it and drove his knife between its ribs; Barkless and Sea Mist jumped in to slash its legs. The thing staggered and sparked and dropped to its knees with a quiet whirring-down. Staring, breathing heavily, Tabitha remembered all too late that they were in a commune of robotics.

...Maybe I’m a little too Stormworld for Serenity.

‘What the hell are you doing!?’ said a slight beige figure, running out into the square. Saa looked mortified. ‘Whoa! Ow! Ow!’ the man said in sudden panic, as Tabitha’s retainers yelled and barked and forced him to the ground.

‘Let him go!’ Tabitha commanded them, stepping in to help him up. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she told the dishevelled scientist, as he stared at them in fright. When he glanced at his sparking creation slumped lifelessly behind them, Tabitha could see the heartbreak in his alien eyes.

Oh god, Tabitha told herself, watching Saa try to smooth things over with the shouting scientists. I’ve gone feral. She watched Saa face a barrage of animated shouts and screams.

‘They’d... prefer that we leave, Majesty,’ Saa said pleasantly, after failing to get in a single calming word. Sugarcoating the scientists’ raging rants behind her.

‘I’m so, so sorry,’ Tabitha told them emphatically, completely at a loss. Holding back her yelling retainers, before they stepped up to the scientists in a clan war.

‘The Ministry will cover the cost, Majesty,’ Saa reassured her, ushering them quickly toward the entrance. ‘Perhaps it’s best if we just... move on.’

‘I thought we might tour a couple of theatres and bars tonight, Majesty, if that appeals?’ Saa suggested, as they returned in the limo to the capital’s towering centre. ‘My apologies for the complete lack of notice, by the way,’ she fretted, clearly annoyed with herself. ‘I just... didn’t want to mention the city at night, then not give you a chance to see it.’

‘No, I think that’s a great idea,’ Tabitha replied, trying to hide her eagerness. Glancing at her retainers, who hadn’t understood. With all her doubts about the Ministry, she didn’t trust Saa... but she saw what was on offer too. It was a chance to build some rapport with her, and maybe even get to the truth. For her friends it was another glimpse at a different culture; a chance for them to relax. But mostly her decision was entirely selfish. One last remnant of a social life she recognised. A real night out for once, just for herself, to forget what she was and everything she’d been through. A night to save her sanity.

Tabitha returned to the penthouse alone to shower, with something to look forward to for a change, and found a wide flat giftbox by the front doors. Taking it into the lounge to open it, she unfolded an elegant new dress, delivered anonymously, but with the words For the Queen of the Heavens on the tag. An expensive gift from that tall beautiful creature she’d met briefly in the bar; the lightning-ribboned master of ceremonies. The man with the warning, about Serenity’s leading lights.

Maybe even a friend here? she wondered, naively. No, of course not. Just another powerful person, with an agenda. Just looking to buy another piece in the game. Tabitha studied the faded-colour dress with a longing sigh, the finest work she’d ever seen, and put it back in the box on principle. She walked away to shower and change, and tried to remember if anyone had bought her a dress before. Trying every other outfit in the bedroom mirrors though... they really didn’t compare. She could just try it on though... it’d be a waste not to see how it looked. She wouldn’t wear it out, she promised herself, as she pulled it again from the box. She just had to see if it would fit.

Tabitha stepped into the limo on her penthouse landing pad with a cocktail already in her. It helped her forget that she was wearing that dress she’d promised herself not to; that it really wasn’t a big deal. And it probably wasn’t, anyway. She overthought things. She always did.

‘You look entirely different, Majesty,’ Saa said in surprise, as Tabitha joined her in the limo.

‘Good different?’ Tabitha replied, smiling.

‘Definitely good different,’ Saa said happily. ‘I haven’t seen you in makeup and jewellery before.’

‘I’m surprised I still knew what to do with it,’ Tabitha chuckled, as Saa poured her a drink.

‘Don’t people use cosmetics where you’re from, Majesty?’ said Saa, handing her a thin glass of clear wine.

‘They... used to,’ Tabitha said sadly. ‘A long time ago.’

‘Well. To keeping an art form alive,’ Saa replied brightly, clinking Tabitha’s glass with her own. Tabitha thought of Earth and felt the grief like a gaping pit inside her. She blanked it out, and smiled to Saa as the limo lifted away. After everything that’d happened, she refused to let things get her down tonight. This was her big night out, after all. One last reminder of a normal life in ancient history... with old friends she could truly understand.

‘Welcome,’ Saa said happily, as the limo doors opened on the park and Tabitha’s retainers climbed in. Deep Roots and Barkless were staring suspiciously; it even took Sea Mist a moment to take in Dark Storm’s new look. She had her great fiery mane pinned up and tamed for some reason; her mouth was too red and her eyes lined with black. She wore something entirely different, and not a fur or feather in sight. This was some misty hide they’d never seen before, that would never survive a hunt or a fight. She’d removed her war-adornments and wore only a small bone necklace, and things hanging from her ears. She didn’t look like their queen.

‘...I should go back and change,’ Tabitha told Saa, with a worried look at her retainers.

‘As you wish, Majesty,’ Saa replied with concern. ‘Though... and meaning no offence... many venues uphold particular dress codes.’

‘So they wouldn’t let me in with what I normally wear?’ Tabitha replied.

‘...I would recommend other venues in that case, Majesty,’ Saa said carefully.

No, then. Tabitha looked again at her retainers. Barkless Tree was shaking his head now, like he’d come around.

‘Good,’ he assured her with a smile, motioning to Tabitha’s appearance. ‘New.’ She could count on Barkless to open up to new ideas; but Sea Mist and Deep Roots stayed quiet in their disapproval. It’d be better to just go back and change... even if she did feel more herself like this.

Or do I just exist to please everyone else, like I always have? she asked herself in the silence. How I look isn’t for anyone else to decide.

‘...You, Queen,’ Deep Roots conceded, with a warmer look growing across his face. ‘You, lead.’ Sea Mist glanced at him; her stony expression softened into loyalty when she looked back.

‘...You, happy,’ she told her sister. ‘We, want.’ Tabitha smiled widely at that.

‘Thank you,’ she told her friends happily. ‘And I know, I must look strange in all this... but it means a lot to me, just for one night. And I’m still Kha V’ha, under all this crap,’ she added, tapping her knuckles on her heart.

‘Still, Kha V’ha,’ Deep Roots echoed gently, with clear relief.

‘Party Kha V’ha,’ Barkless added.

‘Party Kha V’ha, that’s right,’ Tabitha chuckled, grinning. ‘How about you, sis?’ she asked Sea Mist jokingly. ‘Are you sure I can’t persuade you, to try a dress like this?’ Tabitha pinched the fabric and pointed to her. ‘Maybe some earrings?’

‘No! No,’ Sea Mist replied hurriedly, backing away from the idea. ‘You, keep. Good.’

‘Well, if you’re sure?’ Tabitha teased.

‘We, go now,’ Sea Mist added abruptly, nodding at the driver, before anything else could happen on the subject.

‘Ok, ok,’ Tabitha chuckled. ‘Alright. Shall we get going?’ she asked Saa with a smile.

Tabitha led her friends from the limo at their first glamorous venue; overjoyed to be with them on a real night out. The ornate aircar attracted a chattering crowd outside the soft-lit theatre, as the Sky Queen and her warrior-retainers walked inside.

After that first venue though, Deep Roots had been so horrified by the ghostly artificial lights and music in the darkness that he was convinced no good could come of them. He just wanted to be somewhere good and real, he explained; he was clearly agitated by all this. After a drawn-out disagreement with Sea Mist, that they should go wherever she went, Tabitha convinced them that it really was alright to take a break from protecting her, and accept the limo back to their familiar park.

‘Would you prefer to join them, Majesty?’ said Saa outside the theatre, with a look of concern. ‘I’d never want to divide you,’ she said sadly. ‘I... I should never have suggested this night.’

‘No, it’s alright,’ Tabitha sighed, as she watched the limo take off with her friends. She knew that she should be in there too, and she wasn’t. It was completely selfish; she was a terrible leader. She’d never been leadership material anyway. Barkless or Sea Mist should be leading their own people, not her. ‘...Let’s just have that drink,’ she said, with a hopeless smile. I know where they’re coming from, she told herself. This world’s strange, and I can see why it might look demonic. But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t frustrated. After everything that’s happened, I really needed tonight. ...We’re just so different. We shouldn’t have come to this world.

‘Something’s really bothering you,’ Saa insisted quietly, as she hailed an elegant hovering taxi. Suddenly she sounded more like a friend than an advisor. ‘I’ve been reluctant to say it Majesty, and with all respect, but there’s... a cultural gap,’ said Saa. ‘That can’t be easy for you.’ Her words hit Tabitha like a ton-weight, and they hurt. It was so obvious, and she’d been going along like it wasn’t an issue. Yes, the tribe called her a daughter, spiritually; they followed her like a queen because she was just really hard to kill. But she didn’t truly think like they did. She wasn’t even their species. Saa hadn’t meant the comment maliciously; if anything it was getting harder to see malice or deception in her at all.

‘But, even world leaders are allowed an evening off,’ Saa added brightly. ‘You’re simply here to learn more about Serenity, and the Ministry,’ she said, trying to change the subject. ‘Perhaps we could just sit and talk about it. I’m sure you have many questions about life here in the federation. Personally, Majesty, I think this would be an excellent time to discuss things in more detail. So... call it an informal consultation. With drinks.’ Tabitha smiled gratefully. She finally made up her mind, and walked on with Saa to the taxi. The worst part was, that smile... she’d meant it.

44

‘I love them. They’re my friends,’ Tabitha confided in Saa a little later, as they sat sipping cocktails in a futuristic bar on the waterfront. ‘They have to make all this stuff weird, though,’ she sighed, glancing around at the lights and skyscrapers and hologram billboards, lighting up the city like a vast gorgeous casino. Tabitha couldn’t deny that this utopian world was growing more appealing, and she’d already been here longer than she’d intended. She knew she shouldn’t be talking to a Ministry aide like this, either; to a woman she knew she should doubt. Maybe it was just simple familiarity, or alcohol, or lonely desperation... but in this new galaxy of people she didn’t trust, Saa was the one person she distrusted the least.

God, that’s tragic, Tabitha laughed at herself. The chilled glasses of tasty truth serum weren’t helping either, to keep certain things unsaid.

‘Well, I’m here to help you decide on Ministry membership, after all,’ Saa replied. ‘Or not, if that’s the best decision. It’s my job to listen to your concerns, Majesty. Especially regarding any... incompatibilities, between your people and the Ministry lifestyle. Recent events have been a time of great upheaval for your people, I’m sure. You’re burdened with leading them through times of difficult change.’

‘I can see where they’re coming from though,’ Tabitha replied, as Saa listened quietly. ‘If you ever get to see Stormworld, you’ll know why. It’s ancient,’ she said. ‘It’s raw, and wild, and beautiful... but there’s nothing like this.’

‘What do your retainers make of this way of life, Majesty?’ said Saa.

‘Call me Tabitha. Please,’ she replied, tired of hearing her fake title. She sipped her heady purple cocktail. ‘To be honest, they see all this as kind of... demonic,’ she admitted. ‘But that’s fine. That’s what they believe, and that’s how they make sense of things.’

‘But you don’t?’ said Saa.

‘I’m not like them,’ Tabitha replied sadly, almost guiltily.

‘Yet you’re still their chosen ruler,’ Saa assured her, sipping her drink.

‘Well, yes,’ said Tabitha, looking out at the city lights rippling in the dark sea along the bay. ‘But like you said, there’s definitely a culture gap. Well, two gaps now,’ she added, smiling helplessly as she looked around at the alien city.

‘And you’ll bridge those gaps, in time,’ said Saa, with a reassuring smile. ‘Look at everything you’ve achieved already. You’ll handle it.’

‘...Thanks,’ Tabitha replied, her worried expression giving way to a weary smile. Saa clinked her glass.

‘For tonight though, I’d recommend that you focus purely on cultural research.’

‘Is that what this is?’ Tabitha chuckled, looking around at the lively bar.

‘It’s crucial that you build a firm understanding of Serenian nocturnal culture,’ Saa replied, smiling as she waved a waiter over with more cocktails. Tabitha smiled.

‘Well, I’ll drink to that,’ she said happily. Putting her responsibilities to the back of her mind, just for a little while longer.

The next bar on Saa’s itinerary was a more avant-garde affair. Many of the guests in the grand central lounge wore bizarre robotic fashion; panelled dresses glowing in eerie lightshows, or great winged collars with waving crowns of bionic spines. One fine maned creature mid-conversation had his drink and some sort of vapour pipe held by beautiful droidic arms, worn behind his shoulders. A woman in a distant blue corner wore nothing but a kind of skeletal robokini, talking and laughing with a gaggle of admirers asking for autographs.

‘What do you think?’ Saa asked Tabitha, as they headed towards the monolithic marble bar.

‘It’s... revealing,’ Tabitha mumbled, still watching the celebrity. ‘Would it just fall off her if the batteries died?’

‘About the venue, Majesty,’ Saa added with a chuckle.

‘Ohh. Well, it’s gorgeous,’ Tabitha replied approvingly, over the soaring instrumental that pulsed through the powder-pale room. She sipped her glass of water and tried to look less tipsy than she was. ‘I’m sorry, by the way,’ she said. ‘You’ve bought every drink tonight. I kind of... don’t have any money.’

‘Please don’t worry about it, Majesty,’ Saa replied happily, catching the attention of the bartender in the distance. ‘This is all on Ministry expenses.’ She ordered them a bottle of some kind of exotic wine. The bartender wasted no time in producing an extremely premium-looking bottle and two fine fluted glasses before them on the bar. Tabitha wondered about money for a moment, and hated herself for it. She asked anyway.

‘...Are the Ministers paid, to do what they do?’ she tried.

‘Yes Majesty,’ Saa replied, clearly surprised that Tabitha had to ask. ‘Were you to decide on a place on the Ministry council, you would of course receive a generous salary,’ she continued. Tabitha raised her eyebrows at that.

‘...How generous?’ she said quietly, leaning in.

‘World leaders in the Ministry collective each receive a standard ten million credits annually, by the Serenian calendar,’ Saa replied sincerely, as she poured their wine. Tabitha choked on her water.

‘That sounds like a lot,’ she said hoarsely, wiping her dripping chin. ‘Is that a lot?’

‘It’s... extremely sufficient, by average living standards,’ Saa replied with a smile. ‘I earn around two percent of that per year, for example.’ Tabitha choked on her water again.

‘So... I could afford a penthouse, like the one I’m staying in?’ Tabitha wondered.

‘A number of penthouses of that size, I should imagine,’ Saa replied with a smile, handing Tabitha a glass of swirling wine. ‘Though your current penthouse and limousine are already paid for in your name, as a gesture of goodwill, whether or not you decide to join the Ministry council. Should you ever wish to return to the Capital in future.’

‘I see,’ Tabitha replied stoically, wheeling out her trusty Britishness in the face of this development. ‘But I’d still be able to live with my tribe on Stormworld, if I did join the council?’

‘You would normally divide your time evenly between Serenity and Stormworld, Majesty,’ Saa replied. ‘And holiday on any world in the Ministry collective, of course.’

‘I don’t think my people would take kindly to it though,’ Tabitha explained, sipping her wine. Should I be telling her all this? ...But who else can I tell? I have to make this decision. She’s the only person here I know. ‘...I’d be setting a double standard,’ she fretted.

‘Or bridging the gap, as we mentioned earlier,’ Saa replied. She did have a point.

‘...What would you do, if you had the choice?’ Tabitha said uncertainly.

‘I’m afraid I’m not in a position to advise world leaders directly, Majesty,’ Saa replied professionally.

‘So... advise a friend?’ Tabitha tried, almost desperately. Holding Saa’s gaze, she watched the woman begin to smile.

‘As a friend, I would tell you to bridge the gap,’ Saa replied. Tabitha looked down at the bar, deep in thought.

I don’t know what to do, she said to herself, in profound frustration. What does Stormworld stand to lose if it joins the Ministry? ...What does it stand to lose if it doesn’t?

‘Something to think about, perhaps,’ Saa suggested, meeting Tabitha’s thoughtful gaze. ‘There’s no rush.’

Tabitha surprised herself with her restraint; she’d managed to coast along on just pleasantly tipsy all night. She wasn’t even slurring her words.

‘Thank you, for tonight,’ she told Saa sincerely, as the limo glided to a stop outside her penthouse. ‘You’ve really helped.’

‘That’s my job, Majesty,’ Saa replied happily, as the limo door swept open.

‘Actually... why don’t you come in?’ said Tabitha, trying not to rip her dress on the ornate limo as she climbed out. ‘You’re welcome to stay in one of the bedrooms tonight. They aren’t being used,’ she added. ‘And... it’d be good to carry on talking things over. If you want to, I mean.’

‘Are you sure?’ Saa replied. ‘I don’t wish to be a burden.’

‘You’re not a burden, come on,’ Tabitha replied warmly. ‘You can show me how to work that bloody video screen.’ Chuckling, Saa climbed out and waved the limo driver on into the night.

‘So back on Stormworld I found that wristcom, that the Guardians wanted as evidence,’ Tabitha told Saa, as they sat back on a sofa each in the penthouse lounge. Saa was flicking through calibrations on the large video screen facing them on the wall; a sort of hologram TV. ‘There was a network, on that wristcom. In Trade Language,’ Tabitha continued.

‘The star net,’ Saa replied.

‘Yeah,’ said Tabitha. ‘So... why could those mercenaries use it too?’

‘The star net is a free and open resource, Majesty. We broadcast it as widely as possible into uncharted space,’ Saa replied. ‘Unfortunately, it’s also free and open to criminal gangs, despite Guardian efforts to shut them down.’

So the Ministry honestly wasn’t connected with those invaders on Stormworld? Tabitha almost asked her. With a sudden realisation, she stopped herself. Maybe Saa really didn’t know anything about that. In her position, on her pay... the Ministry probably wouldn’t tell her anyway. It was a question for these ministers themselves, if she’d ever actually get to meet them.

‘Majesty?’ said Saa on the other couch, as Tabitha sat in thoughtful silence.

‘Sorry,’ she smiled. ‘So yeah, on that star net... I found some strange sites on there.’ Saa chuckled.

‘Well, there are certainly plenty of those,’ she replied, waving her hand to flick through endless channels on the hologram widescreen across the room. ‘There’s a new application actually, here. Entirely unconnected, by the way. It’s been on the news,’ she said, bringing it up on the screen. ‘Everyone loves it.’

‘What does that say?’ Tabitha replied, deciphering the strange Trade Language letters on the website. ‘Mind...?’

‘Lae-es,’ Saa offered, pronouncing the unfamiliar word. ‘Sort of like... meld. Or join.’

‘What does it do?’ said Tabitha, sipping her hot drink.

‘It’s software, developed by the Science Academy,’ Saa replied. ‘It uses sound that sort of... lets people’s brains calm or tingle one other, with waves of thought.’

‘...What for?’ Tabitha replied, studying the load screen.

‘Well, just for fun really. It’s a game, to bring people of any species together,’ Saa explained. ‘It’s very popular at parties,’ she assured her. ‘Like this.’

‘...I can feel it,’ Tabitha said in surprise. A strange sensation massaged her mind, and sent gentle tingles through her scalp. ‘Is that you?’

‘That’s me,’ Saa replied happily, as she focussed on the shifting wave patterns gliding across the screen.

‘How are you doing that?’ Tabitha said slowly, her eyes half-closing at the soft smooth sensation in her head.

‘The software’s bouncing inaudible sound into my brain, like the ones we use in our hospitals,’ Saa replied, smiling as she sent a thought to the screen. She watched the soundwave visuals ripple like water. ‘It takes my brainwaves as input, and bounces them back to yours.’

‘Whoa,’ Tabitha replied quietly, as she felt the rippling sensation tingle gently through her scalp.

‘Was that... unpleasant?’ said Saa, with sudden concern.

‘Not at all, it was nice,’ Tabitha replied happily. Closing her eyes as she enjoyed the tingling sensation in her head. ‘And people really play this at parties? Isn’t it kind of... intimate?’

‘Well, aren’t parties a time to be intimate?’ Saa replied.

‘Good point,’ said Tabitha, relaxing where she lay. ‘Maybe we’re not as intimate where I come from,’ she wondered. ‘Unless it’s just me.’

‘You wouldn’t be alone, Majesty,’ Saa replied. ‘Some cultures among the Ministry worlds detest anything like this. Though here we simply see it as a kind of... digital drug.’

‘Well, when in Rome...’ Tabitha mumbled.

‘Sorry, Majesty? Rome?’

‘Oh. Never mind,’ Tabitha replied brightly. The tingling massage sensation was becoming... not harder, just more intense. As if there was more intention behind it; more confidence. The fact that these feelings were coming from Saa... it wasn’t really sexual, but what was this? This was a whole new map of grey area... but it was a nice shade of grey.

‘I’m definitely on board with this,’ Tabitha said softly, trying to blink her eyes open despite the growing fog in her brain. ‘Can I do this in your head too?’

‘Just focus your thoughts on the screen,’ Saa replied. Tabitha stared at the flowing waves on the hologram screen and thought about warping them. To her astonishment, just like that, the curving lines began to move. She could shake their flowing lattice like a wire fence with nothing but a thought. Tap at them like a glowing drum, or strum them like a harp of light.

‘That’s nice,’ Saa said quietly, lying back for a while. Sighing with satisfaction. ‘You’re good at this.’ Tabitha was just trying to work out if this was awkward or not; Saa was clearly enjoying the sensation. Whatever vague digital boundary was there, Tabitha felt like she’d crossed it.

This is so weird, she said to herself, as she focussed her intentions back on the screen.

Isn’t it? Saa replied. Tabitha glanced at her in silent shock.

You can read my–

Thoughts, Saa finished.

Should we–

Stop? Came Saa’s voice. We can... but I kind of don’t really want to.

...Me neither, Tabitha replied. Is this–

Professional? Saa finished. I don’t know. Do you care?

No, Tabitha admitted. Do you? Saa didn’t reply; she only sent tingles through Tabitha’s head. It felt like her brain had floated off into a warm vanilla bath, somewhere in heaven. Like she wasn’t entirely in that room right now. Like she wasn’t entirely who she was supposed to be.

You’re very guarded, you know, Saa told her.

...It’s been hard, Tabitha confided in her, unsure if her mental voice was even her own. Her gold-vanilla thoughts were bleeding to inky blue. Curling and crunching into rot-grey lacrimosa. I’ve felt so alone, she admitted, as if all this inner world was rainfall tears. I’ve lost everyone I’ve ever loved. Saa didn’t reply; Tabitha only felt an unfolding sensation in her mind, like a great glowing bloom. As if Saa had reached out, and hugged everything she was; all her faults and failings and frightened dreams. All was fresh orange scent and smooth golden glass. Celestial sculptures that were, and were not. For a few moments, Saa’s mind made her feel... high.

‘Hmm,’ Tabitha sighed, relaxing. Opening her eyes. She looked over at Saa on the other sofa, watching her. Smiling gently.

What was that? That feeling? Tabitha asked her.

No one seems to know, Saa replied in her head. Everyone who tries it feels the same thing, like a drug. You just seemed under so much pressure... I wanted this to help.

...You’re a good friend to have, Tabitha told her, as she felt her mind floating with Saa’s.

And you’re in grief, Saa replied sincerely. I think this was the one thing you needed more than anything.

Intimacy? Tabitha said uncertainly.

Therapy, Saa replied gently. It hit like a revelation. Connection. A moment to heal.

For a few silent minutes, they spoke without saying a word. They talked about thoughts and feelings that were really no different at all, even galaxies apart. All that was foreign and strange and otherworldly about one another drifted away like mist. Tabitha came to learn how deeply guarded Saa was too. Her bright-skinned aide had come through a hard life on another world, before she’d found her way here; harder than she could handle at that young age. In feeling her thoughts, one after another, Tabitha gradually began to understand someone who was warm, and ambitious, and deeply sad. Deeply in need of something, anything, to anchor her to a single point.

‘...You’re just looking for a friend here too, aren’t you?’ said Tabitha, when they stood on the balcony later that night. Saa looked her in the eyes. She only came closer and hugged her, and didn’t say a word.

45

Tabitha saw off a lighter, happier Saa to the limo the next morning. She wished she felt the same though; there was a nagging sadness in the back of her mind.

She tried a couple of new outfits, hanging fresh beside her catsuit and furs in the walk-in wardrobes. She showered and dressed, and headed down in the elevator for the shining main lobby. She wished her usual good morning to the many-limbed guard at the reception desk, still couldn’t work out if it was a lady or a gentleman, and crossed the tree-lined street for the park.

‘Hey,’ she said brightly, as her retainers turned and smiled to see her. She just hoped they were ok with her, after she’d sent them away last night. Well... I did try to convince them that they could take a break too.

‘Come,’ said Deep Roots happily by the campfire, showing off a wad of leaves in his hand. Four cups stood on the grass by his crossed legs.

‘We’re having tea?’ Tabitha replied, smiling. Relieved that her friends seemed alright with her. ‘Where did you find that?’ Did you buy it?’ she said, pointing to the dried leaves. The old man just grinned, and kept his secrets as he boiled it up. But mostly he didn’t want her to know about the people who’d chased him out of that market, for taking the leaves off a stall. No one had ever chased him for taking leaves on Stormworld.

‘It’s been ages since we’ve had our tea,’ said Tabitha, reminiscing about the lakeshore back home. Despite everything she’d been through on that hard winter shore, she missed the wild grey place. It was too warm here to really appreciate a hot drink, she thought, as she blew her tea and sipped it beside her friends. It just wasn’t the same.

Sitting on the grass with Sea Mist, watching Deep Roots and Barkless spearfishing together in the newly stocked pond, Tabitha drifted off for a moment into a deep sad silence.

‘...Stormworld,’ Sea Mist told her, watching the look in her eyes.

‘How did you know?’ Tabitha replied, turning to her. The summer breeze crackled through the campfire beside them.

‘This,’ Sea Mist told her, nodding at the distant skyscrapers all around. ‘This, place. Tame. Makes spirit, hungry.’

She couldn’t shake the thoughts for the rest of the day. As she lay back down on the grass that evening, Tabitha realised how much she missed the sound of mothbirds. The crackle of the hearthfire, and the sweet smell of woodsmoke on the frozen air. The warmth of furs on a cold snowy morning. Nothing to do all day but live. Today reminded her of that. It didn’t feel right here. She grabbed at the pantherwolf fur on her shoulders to wrap it close around her, and realised it wasn’t there. She’d left it in the penthouse, with her catsuit. The sharp futuristic outfit she was wearing suddenly felt all wrong, and it didn’t agree with the grass and dirt at all. She didn’t need that fur to sleep in out here, the nights were so warm, and it wasn’t like her ribbed black catsuit was surgically attached...

But anything else feels wrong.

Tabitha blinked her eyes open on the grass the next morning to the sound of a message on her wristcom. The gentle noise woke Barkless close by.

I had a gift delivered to your penthouse, Saa’s message read on the screen. Something to enjoy the brighter parts of your past, while you work for the future. I hope it helps.

When Tabitha returned to the penthouse that morning, she did a double-take at the large tubular seat off in the corner to her left. There was a note on it.

Find your peace.

Saa

Nervous, tight-shouldered, Tabitha approached the strange machine. She pressed a blue button that made it hiss softly and fold open, and lay back in it uncertainly like a dentist’s chair. The cylinder whirred and folded shut around her.

Suddenly the solid white plastic she was seeing... wasn’t what she saw. Turning around, free to walk and move, she found herself in an alien place. Distant; ancient. Her mum’s living room, in her old house in Wales. And right there in front of her... oh god.

‘Mum?’ Tabitha said quietly, voice trembling, as she edged towards her. That grey sensible hairdo… the old cardigan she wore around Christmas time… and that impish smile.

‘Hello love,’ her mum said warmly, coming over to hug her tight. Tabitha’s mind was blank. All she knew then was the smell of her mum’s perfume. The soft bobbly feel of that cardigan against her cheek, when they hugged each other tight. Tabitha looked her mum over in shock, and tried to speak. The only sound she could make was a quiet sob.

‘Don’t cry love. You’ll set me off too,’ her mum said softly, tugging a crumpled tissue from her sleeve to put in her hand. ‘You’re home now.’ Tabitha smiled through her tears; sobbing and speechless. The living room window came into focus beyond that old plastic Christmas tree; it was snowing outside in a white-grey sky. Fairy lights blinked warmly on the tree’s thinning branches. A homely smell of roast potatoes from the kitchen. The flickering gas fire in the mantelpiece. And another shape beyond her, blurred at first, but growing sharper by the second. Walking in from the mist. A reaching figure, who planted an old familiar fairy on top of the tree.

‘Dad?’ Tabitha said in quiet shock, white as a sheet.

‘Hello you,’ he said, his voice all warmth and calm, with a huge proud grin. ‘You’re all grown up.’ Tabitha watched her dad’s eyes creasing up; trying to smile through his grief. He moved too fast towards her to let his tears show, and grabbed her in a strong hug. Tabitha held him so tight that it ached her trembling arms. She didn’t stop for a second to wonder why he was here, in case he went away. There was only that musty smell of his creased old shirt around her; a moment she never wanted to end. His gentle eyes, streaming tears. His husky sobs and gurning grin. The feel of his hard kisses on her head. Tabitha cried into his shoulder and felt her mum hug her from the side. Lost to the world, as the same old Christmas songs fuzzed and crackled from the radio in the kitchen.

The sound of the doorbell stirred Tabitha from her reverie.

‘Your friends are here, love,’ her mum called from the hallway. Tabitha heard her welcome in shuffling feet and glad shivery voices from the cold outside, as they took off their coats and shoes.

‘Who is it?’ Tabitha asked her dad uncertainly, standing close beside him.

‘What do you mean, who is it?’ he chuckled. ‘It’s your friends, love. You invited them, you daft sod.’

‘Come in, come in!’ her mum fussed, waving to the footsteps and voices. Leading them into the living room. ‘Sit yourselves down. I’ll put the kettle on.’ It took Tabitha a moment to make out their faces as they came in; they were practically grey shades before they turned around to look at her. Ghosts.

‘Will?’ Tabitha gasped, staring in shock. Liv was grinning beside him, and Jim. Paul and Natalie, and the twins with her... and Emma and Jen. Tabitha didn’t say a word; she just stood staring at the tear-blurry shapes of her friends. She felt her heart aching happily in a single frozen second, as her mum brought in a plate of mince pies.

‘Come on love, what’s up with you?’ her dad said gently beside her, pushing her softly to her friends. ‘Say hello.’ Tabitha edged towards them, as if they’d shatter at the slightest touch; Liv burst into happy tears and all but tackled her in a tight embrace. The sister she never had. Tabitha looked into her big brown tearful eyes, and said nothing but a smile. She let go suddenly at a soft steady thumping on the back of her knee. A wagging tail. One glance at Laika’s mismatched eyes smiling up at her, and Tabitha burst into tears again. She knelt to stroke her collie desperately with shaking hands, as her dog fussed and whined and licked her cheeks.

‘Hi Dogface,’ she whispered shakily, wiping her eyes. ‘...How are you all here?’ she managed, gulping back the happy grief in her throat. Jim and Will looked at each other like they didn’t understand.

‘We drove here, you silly bugger,’ Emma chuckled, confused. She sat down on the couch to take a mince pie from the plate. ‘Are you alright? Has she been drinking?’ Tabitha’s dad made a sly drinky-drinky motion with his hand, and nodded a smile to his little girl; grinning like a big kid. Tabitha felt like there was somewhere else to be; another life almost. It was strange. It wasn’t... that wasn’t the real world though, that other place. This was real, right here and now. She was just being weird, as usual.

‘She hasn’t stopped crying since she got in, have you love?’ said her mum, coming in with steaming cups of tea while her friends sat down.

‘It’s just really strange,’ Tabitha replied, sniffling; pink-eyed with tears. ‘I don’t understand… I was somewhere else,’ she looked around in a daze, trying to remember another place, like an old dream. The more she grabbed at the memory, the more slippery it became. Grasping at some distant thought, that didn’t matter all that much anyway. Just a stale old nightmare, better off buried.

‘You’ve been gone for so long,’ Jen told her quietly, heart to heart. ‘Tabitha.’

‘I…’ Tabitha could only stare at her though. There was something wrong. Something else, nagging her. Glancing in the mirror, her eyes were shifting and flickering to gold. Back to green. Back to gold. Her hands, blushing from pale freckled skin to hard black metal.

‘Tabitha,’ Liv insisted, holding her by the shoulders. ‘Hey!’

‘W-what’s wrong?’ Tabitha asked her, looking deep into her worried eyes. There was desperation there; panic. Liv was shaking her firmly, with hands stronger than she’d ever had.

‘What’s…?’ Tabitha looked around at her friends in confusion; they were turning grey. Reaching out to her in concern, as if she was fainting away from them. Her parents, fading to shadows.

‘Tabitha!’ said Liv, in a deep gruff voice. Tabitha turned to her in shock. Suddenly Liv was Barkless Tree, staring with icy eyes; all matted black fur and dog breath. Her mum’s chintzy old living room was suddenly a clear bright space. A gleaming penthouse.

‘What’s happening?’ Tabitha mumbled, looking around, lost in anaesthesia. Three strange beasts were pulling her strongly from the chair.

‘Machine!’ Sea Mist said venomously, taking Tabitha by the hand and leading her to the cushions on the floor. The alien creature grunted back at the seat in the corner with contempt. ‘Puts, magic, on you!’ Tabitha glanced back at the tilted cylindrical chair in the corner. A living lucid dream inside there, still vivid as waking life.

‘But... my friends were there,’ Tabitha replied, lost and confused. ‘My family was right there in front of me, I could feel everything...’

‘Bad magic,’ Deep Roots grunted angrily, walking over to inspect the chair. Pointing like it’d offended him. ‘This, cry magic. Death magic.’ He pulled at the cables around the back of the seat; they squeaked as he tried to snap them.

‘No!’ Tabitha cried out, running back to the chair. ‘Don’t break it!’

‘It breaks you!’ Deep Roots insisted, shaking his head. Keeping her away and tugging harder at the cables. Tabitha felt an anger rising in her; at this strange savage man in this weird new dream. He wanted to take her loved ones away from her. He wanted to deny her that one distant light she’d been given, ever since everything happened. He wouldn’t let go of the cables. She gripped and struggled and tried to take his hands away, but he wouldn’t let go.

‘It, breaks, you!’ he said gruffly, pushing against her to tug at the cables again.

‘Stop it!’ Tabitha screamed desperately, pulling Deep Roots away. Too strongly. The old creature staggered back and fell down hard. Staring silently. He couldn’t have looked more out of place here; a weathered old creature in a pristine white palace. For a moment, Tabitha didn’t see a proud old warrior. She saw a frail old man, shocked and hurt, thrown to the floor by his best friend. She saw the heartbreak in his eyes before he looked away.

‘Oh my god,’ Tabitha mumbled, reaching out to him. He looked away shamefully as Sea Mist and Barkless helped him to his feet. ‘Deep Roots, I’m so sorry,’ she said urgently, feeling the lump in her throat. But the old man just turned away with dented pride, hobbling off to the door with Sea Mist and Barkless behind him.

‘I’m so sorry! ...I saw my family in there, I overreacted! Please understand,’ Tabitha pleaded, walking after them. ‘Please don’t leave.’

‘Bad magic,’ Deep Roots said gruffly over his shoulder, walking out angrily as the door slid open. ‘It breaks you.’

Tabitha was alone in the penthouse for the rest of the day. She cried bitterly at the thought of Deep Roots’ sad stare. But she knew better than to go and find him right now, in his time of no-pride. He wouldn’t face his queen again until he’d grieved and prayed for his failure, his lack of strength, and come back into Fierce-Hope over time. Watching from the balcony, she could see his tiny hunched shape in the park far below, half hidden among the trees. Bowed and weeping, one hand clutching a tree trunk to steady himself, while Barkless and Sea Mist sat tense and silent around the fire in the distance.

Maybe I’m not meant to lead them, Tabitha told herself, heartbroken. Clutching the balcony rail tight. Staring at her rasping black hands, hard and alien. Her new wristcom vibrated then; a message.

From: Saa

Good morning, Majesty.

The Central Ministers extend their greetings and would very much like to meet with you tomorrow, if possible. Please note that this is a preliminary gathering only, and that no policy will be discussed.

The Central Ministers would be pleased to host you as their honoured guest at the Gold-Misted Sun Restaurant, tomorrow at midday. Transport from your penthouse is already arranged.

If you have any doubts or concerns, never hesitate to contact me.

Your many-honoured servant,

Saa

Tabitha breathed deep and tense as she read the message again. The way she felt right now, it couldn’t have come at a worse time. She felt the dread rising in her at the prospect of talking business with anyone, much less these ministers. But that was why she was here, after all. She caught herself before the anxiety set in.

...I’ll handle it. I have to.

She couldn’t say anything to Deep Roots when she walked back through the park; things just felt too tense. They stared at one another in stony silence. Her old friend saw the tears shining in her eyes, and grabbed her in a tight hug.

‘I’m so sorry,’ Tabitha mumbled sadly, her voice muffled in the thick animal fur of his shoulder. He just hissed at Deer softly to be quiet, and hugged her tight. Sea Mist and Barkless watched from a distance, smiling at the sight.

Tabitha crammed her Trade Language practise for the rest of the day, trying to prepare for her meeting tomorrow. She curled up against the wind in the park that night and tried to get some sleep, pushing her thoughts back down. She’d need all the rest she could get.

Watching the stars, finding it impossible to drift off, she wandered through the lamp-lit park to take her mind off it. It wasn’t working.

The scent of grass and those ornamental trees filled her head on the cool night air. Water cascaded gently from a stone-hewn fountain on her left, lit softly in the velvet dark. She wandered to the wide square pond, and sat by a stone statue of some angelic avatar. Breathing deeply, she watched the city lights shine and ripple in the clear calm water. Looking around at the park, the trees and flowers here had been tended to perfection. There wasn’t the slightest thing wild about this place. It was too safe, too calm; suddenly she was homesick again. She belonged with her monsters and the Sky Tribe, back on Stormworld. Where life was simple, and savage, and real. She imagined standing beneath the pines, where the cold rain pattered; watching the hard grey lakeshore and the vicious mountains under a stormy iron sky. Feeding fires and gutting kills; hunting with her sister in the wild. Curled up tight in warm furs on the dirt, against the howling frozen wind in the night. Sea Mist was right; this utopian world was tame. No risk, no challenge... nothing to overcome and grow stronger from. It was like their saying; the hardest stones kept a knife sharpest. Without those hardships to test her, where even living through another day was a victory... there just wasn’t the same meaning or satisfaction. The thought struck her.

There’s no need for Fierce-Hope here. I get it now. ...I’ll never find that here.

‘Majesty?’ came Saa’s voice, over her bright new wristcom. ‘Is everything alright?’

‘I just wanted to talk,’ Tabitha sighed, standing at the far side of the pond so that she didn’t wake her retainers. The towering skyscrapers glowed in a looming landscape beyond the trees. ‘I hope I didn’t wake you up?’

‘No no Majesty, I wasn’t sleeping,’ Saa replied, drowsily. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘I... just want to go home,’ Tabitha confessed. ‘I can’t do this, Saa. Politics, I mean. I belong on Stormworld. With my people.’

‘With respect, Majesty, I believe that this is the best place you can be for your people, at least for now,’ Saa said soothingly. Tabitha watched the distant lights of the aircars in the midnight traffic; tiny and endless where they weaved through the city skyline. ‘It’s here that you can make a real difference, Majesty,’ Saa told her. ‘Here, you can make the voice of Stormworld heard. And secure the best future for your people.’

‘I should be with them though,’ Tabitha fretted.

‘And you will be, soon,’ Saa replied gently. ‘Just give us time, to set out the right laws and treaties between our worlds. That’s all.’

‘...To bring us into the fold, you mean?’ Tabitha replied gently; sarcastically.

‘To safeguard your people’s way of life, Majesty,’ Saa urged her. Tabitha sighed, lost in thought. She couldn’t prove that the Ministry was behind the invasion... not yet. But she hadn’t even tried. She’d been playing along with it so well that she didn’t have quite the same conviction any more. But what if she was wrong? What if the Ministry really wasn’t to blame? Mining for gold was hardly evidence against them – any criminal in the galaxy would take that opportunity. On the flip side, Stormworld was so vulnerable right now. Perhaps joining the council was the chance to give it that shield it needed. Maybe then she’d have enough influence to find out who was responsible. Either way, it was better to meet with these Ministers while she was here. Maybe then, she’d get to the truth. Play along, just a little bit longer.

‘Majesty?’ said Saa.

‘...No, you’re right,’ Tabitha replied. ‘It could be what’s best, for my people.’

‘Just give it a chance,’ Saa said gently. ‘If you regret it later, then have Stormworld removed from the Ministry federation. But first, be open to the opportunity?’

‘Yeah,’ Tabitha replied, smiling. ‘...Thank you.’

‘You’re very welcome, Majesty,’ said Saa. ‘Just get some sleep, ok? Everything will be fine. I’ll see you tomorrow.’

‘...Ok. Goodnight Saa,’ said Tabitha. ‘Thanks.’

‘Goodnight, Majesty,’ Saa replied, and didn’t say all she wanted to say.

Tabitha tried again to drift off, but it wasn’t to be. She hardly got any rest that night; she was too busy running through tomorrow in her head. Thinking it over and feeding the beast, until tomorrow wasn’t tomorrow any more. It was today. Her big meeting was a few short hours away. Tired-eyed, she glanced up at the clear sky, and the creeping dawn light.

‘What the hell am I doing?’ she whispered to herself, sighing in the cool morning air. Ministry membership. Politics. Public speaking. Criminal investigation. Making up her sovereignty as she went along. She’d been thrown in with the big ones now. ‘Shit,’ she sighed nervously, feeling an icy cold tremble running through her. All things being well, she could be taking her place in a government of worlds. Having to step up and make the right decisions for an entire race; to lead and protect them. Nothing could’ve prepared her for this. Why was this on her shoulders? Her frightened thoughts turned to run. Escape. Get back to Seven and Fishbowl, and fly away.

‘...Shit,’ she sighed again.

‘You, queen,’ said Barkless Tree, sitting down beside her in the dawn light. Watching the fear and doubt on her face. ‘We, crown.’ He pointed to her. ‘You.’ Tabitha met his soul-searching gaze.

‘What would you do?’ she said. ‘What do the people want?’

‘Not, king,’ Barkless replied simply, with a shrug. ‘Not, know. People, follow, Sky Queen.’

‘Not helping,’ Tabitha chuckled hopelessly, picking the grass where she sat.

‘Be, strong,’ said Barkless, nodding. ‘Keep, Fierce-Hope. For tribe,’ he said. ‘For, you.’

46

Later Tabitha found herself sitting with four high-ranking ministers, in a quiet restaurant cut right out of heaven. Everything here was silver and gold, from the glasses and cutlery to the giant chandelier, levitating over the heart of the room. The view from the glass walls showed the full sweep of the summer-haze city along the bay. They’d been dining for a while now; accommodating their guest with expensive nutrient drinks when they learned she couldn’t eat solid food. So far the ministers had dealt mostly in polite small talk about Serenity, and expressed their admiration for Stormworld’s stand against its invaders. The conversation trailed off to a satisfied lull as they finished their meals.

‘I must say Majesty, your Trade Language is quite impressive,’ said the tall wintry minister. It was stark-eyed; neither male nor female.

‘I’ve got some help,’ Tabitha admitted, smiling politely. Pointing to her wristcom, and the translation software talking in her earpiece.

‘Well, give yourself credit,’ the minister replied. ‘Your speech shows remarkable dedication.’ Tabitha smiled.

‘So, what do you think of the heavenly essence, Majesty?’ said the smart blue-skinned woman, relaxing with a cocktail in her slender hand.

‘I’ve never tasted anything like it,’ she replied politely, as their immaculate waiter cleared the table in silence. The strange drink sipped like a sweet smooth cordial, wispy-light and utterly refreshing, but filled her stomach like a Sunday roast. She’d missed that feeling. Tabitha searched her head for a high-society pleasantry in response. ‘I’m not sure I have all the necessary senses to appreciate it,’ she said. Their faces lit up around her. Nailed it.

‘No one does,’ the blue woman lamented. ‘It’s a shame.’

‘I could drink a hundred and still wish for more,’ the large reptilian agreed, in his croaking broken accent. ‘Though, that approach does account for my present condition.’ He chuckled and patted his huge gut with a big scaled hand; the others smiled politely and didn’t wish to offend by agreeing with him. A smiling silence followed around the table, broken by the return of their waiter with a selection of bright phials in a delicate silver rack. Tabitha watched as something like an angelic hookah pipe rose from the opening centre of the table.

‘What’s this?’ she asked them curiously, looking around as the others each took a corded mouthpiece from the bubbling work of art.

‘This is why we arranged to meet you at this particular venue,’ said the small six-limbed creature, connecting a piped mouthpiece to its bulb-eyed breather helmet. ‘Try some, please. You’re our guest.’ Tabitha took a mouthpiece uncertainly from the stemmed glass vessel and drew on it, filling her mouth with warm sweet vapour. She drew it down into her lungs and let it rest there for a moment, and breathed out the heady concoction. She watched the ministers smiling as they followed suit, letting the pale gold vapour pour and tumble from their mouths. Tabitha waited nervously for some unpleasant rush, but it never came. There was only a soft floating comfort rising inside her; a velvet-chocolate ultrabliss that spread through her limbs. She’d never felt so comfortable in her life.

‘And this is legal?’ she asked her mellowing hosts, taking another calming drag.

‘Very legal, I assure you,’ the wintry figure chuckled, relaxing in its seat. ‘Obscenely expensive, but extremely taxable.’

Tabitha had come to this meeting with a sense of dread, like she was here for the mother of all job interviews. They’d all been so relaxed though, so cool, as they drank and dined and smoked together in this gorgeous space. The large reptilian discussed in detail the singularly haunting beauty of an off-world ballet, currently touring the city; it was the last thing Tabitha had expected to hear from him. The blue-skinned woman had spoken fondly about her child’s first words, her eyes shining with pride. Their questions for Tabitha had been few and far between, and even then only to ask after the welfare of her people. They spoke further on the terrible stories they’d heard, about the mercenary forces that had terrorised her world; thankfully driven back through her bravery and conviction. Tabitha tried her best to awkwardly deflect the praise.

As they chatted on through their dessert courses and golden vapours, Tabitha felt herself slowly understanding them the more she heard. If not on their side completely, then she at least saw where they were coming from. That was all she’d wanted from her visit to this world; to know her enemies. Well... if they actually were her enemies. These people were capitalists, of course... but money was how society lived, after all. She was a product of capitalism herself, in her old life back on Earth; could she really resent them for wanting prosperity for their worlds? For wanting to play their part in a united government of planets, if wealth and harmony were the results?

‘So, Majesty. What do you make of Serenity?’ said the winter figure, taking another deep easy breath of golden vapour.

‘I’ve never seen anything like it,’ Tabitha admitted. ‘It’s magnificent,’ the four ministers looked satisfied at that. ‘All this wealth though... surely there are people out there with much less, on the other united worlds?’

‘Oh, undoubtedly,’ the winter figure replied sincerely. Tabitha was surprised at its honesty. ‘But with much more now than they had, before their days in the Ministry,’ it continued. ‘And with much more wealth to come.’

‘We understand that first appearances can paint a certain portrait of Serenity,’ the small masked creature admitted, taking a hissing breath. ‘It’s not the official line, but none of us on the council deny it; this is the capital world of an empire. This is where all the wealth of the Ministry flows first.’ Tabitha listened in fascinated silence, as if they were airing their whole great dirty secret. That was the thing though; they weren’t treating it like a dirty secret. Quite the opposite, actually. This was the most honest political discussion she’d ever heard.

‘You probably think we invited you here to butter you up. And get you used to the finer things that the Ministry has to offer,’ said the blue-skinned woman with a smile. ‘And you’d be absolutely right.’ Everyone chuckled at that, nodding in agreement. Tabitha was startled by their openness.

‘And that’s precisely the point we’re trying to make,’ the winter figure added, sitting back in its seat. ‘There’s no shortage of wealth out there,’ it assured her, with a pale-eyed glance to the windows. ‘The Ministry has a million prospectors among the stars, discovering new planets all the time. All completely uninhabited. And each one so rich in resources that we can harvest whatever we need, and barely make a scratch on any one planet.’

‘But what about the other worlds in the Ministry?’ said Tabitha. ‘What do they have while Serenity grows richer and richer?’

‘Much more than we had before, I assure you,’ the big reptilian replied. ‘Healthcare, education, enough food on the table to feed our broods – uh, families – and see them flourish. Through peaceful trade, Serenity’s wealth trickles through to all worlds. Some already wealthy, some not.’

‘Organisation is the key,’ the small figure added cryptically, raising a tiny finger. ‘The many worlds of the Ministry are bound to grow wealthier at differing rates; it’s basic economics,’ it explained, in that whispering fuzz through its mask. ‘But the fact remains that all these worlds continue to grow wealthier, at faster rates than they ever have before. The Ministry has opened up the floodgates for their prosperity, which diminishes conflict in direct correlation.’

‘More wealth, less war,’ the blue woman translated, smiling.

‘There’s no shortage of wealth or resources,’ the winter figure added. ‘The only real challenge facing the Ministry, and we as its ministers, is one of... public perception. That somehow there has to be a catch. That all this wealth and prosperity must come at some terrible price in the future.’ It sipped its drink; shifted in its seat. ‘In truth, the only problem these poorer planets face is that there aren’t enough people to ship the wealth back to their worlds. The only shortage is one of populations. People willing to help us gather everything they could need, from a thousand uninhabited planets, and to bring those riches home.’

‘The objectors simply can’t see the abundance for their own doubt,’ said the blue-skinned woman. ‘Together we could build a thousand Serenities out there. No one need ever die of hunger or disease again.’

‘Much less natural predators!’ the masked creature scoffed, as if who had ever heard of such a ridiculous thing. Tabitha knew it was aimed at Stormworld. Aimed at her. She wondered if the six-limbed minister would be so quick to laugh if he ever did come face to face with a predator on Stormworld. But that was his point, she supposed. No one should have to fall prey to anything, if they could enjoy a safer life. As doubtful as she was about the Ministry, at least it could give her people the safety they needed to thrive. Even better if she could leave such a huge decision to a native who could take her place. Barkless would make an outstanding leader, once the language barrier came down. She had no doubt about that. If she could just step back, and be a translator between the two worlds...

‘In time, our societies wouldn’t even need to work for a living,’ the blue woman added thoughtfully, taking another drag of golden mist from the hookah. ‘Twenty-three races, united as one. Free trade and freedom of ideas between worlds, all growing wealthier, every day... just think of everything we could accomplish together. Stormworld’s true, glorious potential lies inside the Ministry collective. You know that, Majesty.’

‘It’s also guaranteed protection, against the kind of mercenaries you’ve fought back already,’ said the small masked figure. ‘The sheer calibre of technology in our collective enables such advanced piracy on neighbouring worlds. Let the Ministry protect your people against it in turn.’

‘So you’re saying those invaders on Stormworld were using Ministry weapons?’ said Tabitha, tackling the subject that’d been eating away at her.

‘Weapons developed for profit and defence, yes. But sometimes obtained by criminal armies through black markets, unfortunately,’ the masked figure replied. ‘And combated accordingly by the Guardians, our Ministry police. It haunts us morally, and hurts us politically, that we were unable to provide protection for your world against such piracy.’

‘So the Ministry had nothing to do with the invasion?’ said Tabitha. ‘Or mining that world for its gold?’

‘Absolutely not,’ the masked figure replied emphatically. ‘It’s tremendously bad practice to inflict war on prospective planets, which could be more readily incorporated by diplomatic and economic persuasion.’ Tabitha raised her eyebrows at that.

‘Not to mention an immoral tragedy, to inflict on innocent peoples,’ the blue woman added quickly, with a smile of apology in Tabitha’s direction. ‘My colleague’s race are a little less sensitive to these things,’ she explained.

‘Take it from me. You owe it to your people,’ the reptilian added bluntly. ‘It would be criminal not to join your world with the Ministry. Refusing would deny your people their rightful future.’

‘...Food for thought, perhaps,’ the winter figure concluded coolly, smiling at Tabitha. Laying down its hookah mouthpiece on the table with careful precision. ‘I do hope that this has proved illuminating for you, Majesty. Let’s meet again soon,’ it said respectfully, as it pushed back its chair and rose from the table. Happy at their new understanding. ‘In the meantime... merely enjoy your stay on Serenity. You’ve earned it.’

‘First Minister?’ Tabitha said quietly, catching the winter-looking figure in the corridor as the others left.

‘Yes, Majesty?’ it said graciously.

‘I’m... not sure how to explain,’ Tabitha began. ‘I’m not native to Stormworld, obviously.’

‘Where are you from originally?’ the minister replied, seemingly open-minded about it.

‘That’s sort of why I wanted to speak with you,’ said Tabitha. ‘My world... it’s gone.’ The words came out heavy as lead, as the minister stared in silence. ‘There was an invasion,’ she continued. ‘We called them the Watchers. This weird, advanced race. They came out of nowhere and took over.’

‘They enslaved your race?’ said the minister.

‘...They wiped us out,’ Tabitha replied. Paling at the thought. ‘We didn’t have any way to stop them, they blacked out all our power,’ she explained. ‘They’ve charted hundreds of other planets to take over. Including Stormworld. Maybe here too.’

‘This is... frightening news,’ the winter figure replied quietly, wide-eyed. ‘Look, let me raise this with the central ministers,’ it advised her. ‘We’ll begin discussions as a matter of utmost urgency, and invite you to advise us on this threat.’

‘So you believe me?’ said Tabitha.

‘Of course, Majesty,’ the figure replied. ‘The Ministry has already seen its fair share of conflict between races. And you’ve given me every reason to trust you so far.’

‘You’ll tell the whole Ministry then?’ said Tabitha. ‘You’ll warn every world?’

‘Yes, of course,’ the winter figure replied gently. ‘...But twinned with the appropriate strategy to combat this threat, which you and I will need to determine first.’ The tall figure fell quiet; deep in thought. ‘We’ll assemble a team of expert advisors, military and scientific. And present our strategy to a Ministry summit, once we know that we can fight these... Watchers. But sharing this news in the wrong way could spread fear and panic across every one of our united worlds. We will need to keep them united, and confident in our victory, if we’re to face this threat and win.’

‘...You’re right,’ Tabitha replied, impressed with its decisiveness. It does have a point.

‘I’ll be in touch, about an initial meeting,’ the figure assured her, as they walked on for the elevator. ‘And Majesty... my utmost condolences, for the loss of your people. And your home.’

‘Thank you,’ Tabitha replied quietly, smiling through her grief, as she took the minister’s offered handkerchief to dry her tears.

Later Tabitha talked through everything with Saa; everything but the Watchers. She wanted to mention it, desperately, but the First Minister was right. Talking about a threat so colossal, without a solution, would only spread panic. Not what they needed, if these worlds were going to join forces and fight back.

Taking Earth back; just imagine. Bringing the war to the Watchers, and making them suffer for everything they’ve done. The thought of revenge burned bright.

Tabitha returned to her friends in the park in high spirits, eager to tell them that Stormworld would be left in peace. Joining the Ministry would guarantee no more invaders; it was a fresh chance for the people to live on as they always had.

And even if someone was behind those mercenaries, I’ll have the power to nail them right to the wall. Her friends listened gladly, intently; maybe there was hope in this strange alliance after all. Barkless looked over at a distant figure coming closer.

‘Sky Queen!’ said a high-voiced creature, scurrying over with his wristcom held up at the ready. Sea Mist shot to her feet and grabbed the running creature by the throat, snarling into his frightened eyes as she reached for her knife.

‘Please stop doing that,’ Tabitha sighed to her.

‘I’m just a journalist. Serenian Free Media Group,’ said the strangled figure helplessly, falling to his knees when Tabitha nodded to Sea Mist to let him go. Coughing and spluttering for a moment on the grass.

‘I apologise for my retainers,’ Tabitha said calmly, affecting her stoic Sky Queen voice. ‘They’re loyal bodyguards.’

‘Perfectly understandable,’ the journalist replied pleasantly, brushing the grass from his pristine clothes. ‘I shouldn’t have approached uninvited.’ Tabitha replied with a subtle polite smile, as if to agree without saying so. She’d been getting pretty good at her subtle polite smile ever since she’d arrived here. These excessively civilised people had a habit of stating the obvious; it was the best response she could give without them taking offence.

‘I was hoping to ask you a few questions for an article, if you don’t mind?’ he said.

‘Of course,’ Tabitha replied pleasantly, motioning to her friends to move back while he sat down.

‘And could I get a video, on my wristcom here?’ he added uncertainly.

‘Absolutely,’ Tabitha replied with a smile. No publicity is bad publicity, she told herself. She’d take any opportunity to talk about Stormworld’s invaders; killing its people and stealing its wealth without a second thought. Even better if the ones behind those mercenaries were dealt a nice hard dose of justice.

‘So, Majesty,’ the journalist began happily, holding his wristcom camera to frame on Tabitha’s smiling face. ‘What are your first thoughts of Serenity?’

‘I’ve never seen a place like it,’ Tabitha replied pleasantly, glancing around the park and the supercity beyond. ‘It’s completely different to anything I’ve seen before. It’s beautiful.’

‘Well, you’re welcome here any time,’ the reporter chuckled warmly, sharing in Tabitha’s smile. ‘Now, there are some strange rumours flying around the star net that these mercenaries who attacked your world were... dealing with some pretty advanced weaponry. Some are even saying it was Ministry Guardian hardware, though that’s unconfirmed of course. What are your thoughts on that? Was it Guardian tech, in your opinion?’

‘Well, I er...’ Tabitha stammered. Nice tightrope of a question there, pal. Thanks a lot. ‘I mean, I couldn’t definitely say that it wasn’t, I don’t know,’ she blurted out, in all honesty. Trying desperately to hide the fact that she didn’t have a clue. He raised his eyebrows for her to continue. ‘So... I couldn’t rule out that it was Guardian tech, or not, I mean I don’t know enough about that to say, I... sorry, can we do that bit again?’

‘This is live I’m afraid,’ the reporter replied pleasantly, with no small hint of satisfaction. ‘You were saying?’

You absolute snake. ‘...Again, I’m no expert on Guardian weaponry. But I believe that this was mercenary hardware.’

‘Mercenary, Ministry hardware?’ the reporter tried. ‘Maybe an inside job?’

‘I don’t believe that it belonged to the Ministry, no,’ said Tabitha. My powerful new friends are going to be watching this carefully. If they think I’m out to get them, I’ll never know the truth.

‘You don’t believe it did? So you didn’t get a good look at the stuff, when you were supposedly tearing it apart with your bare hands?’ the journalist tried.

‘I’m not in a position to answer that question, I’m sorry,’ Tabitha stuttered, feeling all the sudden pressure of worlds bearing down on her. So this is politics.

‘And these rumours that you, ha, ride into battle on some terrible flying death machine,’ the reporter said with a grin. ‘Where’s that tech come from? Is it native to Stormworld?’

‘I, er... my mount is a living, thinking animal which has been–

‘Are you native to Stormworld?’ the reporter interrupted, glaring at her.

‘I was appointed the leader of Stormworld to represent it in–

‘Appointed a world leader by a single tribe, is that right?’ the reporter continued. Mauling her. ‘Some might say a cultist tribe, which you influenced heavily? Was the opinion of other world tribes taken into account, at all?’

‘I, er,...’ Tabitha looked up to see Saa waving desperately, running across the park. Urging her to kill the interview, and kill it now.

‘Your Majesty?’ the reporter asked her, his wristcom camera still on her. Tabitha fixed him with a stare.

‘This interview is over.’

‘Fuck!’ Tabitha snarled, walking back down the hallway to her penthouse with Saa; her retainers trailing behind in confusion.

‘I’ll be busy with damage control for the next couple of days,’ Saa said matter-of-factly, opening the penthouse door to let her guests inside. ‘Please ask for my guidance before you take on any future press enquiries, Majesty. A new political alliance is an extremely delicate situation, for all parties,’ she said with concern.

‘I’m sorry. I didn’t think,’ Tabitha replied sheepishly. Glancing at her retainers, she realised how weak and submissive she looked. I just can’t win. ‘It was a live report though,’ she said. ‘How are you going to run damage control on a live report?’

‘The Ministry has certain rights to step in on coverage deemed politically volatile,’ Saa replied, as if she’d memorised the small print.

‘...Wait, are you talking about making that story disappear?’ said Tabitha.

‘Certain rights to step in on coverage deemed politically volatile, Majesty,’ Saa repeated, avoiding the question.

‘Why does that sound really suspicious to me?’ Tabitha demanded. ‘Saa, we’re friends. We’re closer than this. Please just be honest with me.’ At least, I thought she was a friend. Maybe I’m just too fucking trusting.

‘With respect, Majesty, did you wish that reporter to continue his line of questioning, about your own native origins and right to rule?’ Saa said formally, holding her stare. Hiding her feelings deep down.

‘Well, no...’ Tabitha replied, hesitating.

‘Or his line of questioning about the rumours surrounding these invaders?’ Saa added.

‘That was a fair question though,’ Tabitha replied. I can’t believe I’m defending that bastard. ‘There will be an enquiry though, won’t there? A court case, or something? Surely people have a right to know how the invasion happened?’ said Tabitha. ‘How those mercenaries got hold of so-called Guardian weapons? Wouldn’t the Ministry want to talk about it openly, if they’ve got nothing to hide? ...Saa?’ The woman’s silent glance said everything. ‘Saa, what the fuck!?’ Tabitha snapped. ‘So the invasion was the Ministry!? You knew about it!?’

‘I’ll get the reporter to drop the story,’ Saa told her nervously, stifling her feelings. Heading for the door. ‘It’ll be just another rumour. Nothing to worry about, Majesty.’

‘Saa, why does this all sound really fucking dark and suspicious?’ Tabitha demanded.

‘More than you know,’ Saa replied quietly, meeting her look with a warning glance. Tabitha felt her stomach lurch. She was speechless. Her retainers’ language barrier meant they just stood around in silence, unsure why she was so upset. The demons coming for their world were far bigger than they’d thought.

‘Your first concern is for the safety of your people, Majesty,’ Saa advised her carefully. ‘For that, you may need to make certain compromises.’

‘With a government that was killing my tribe, to rob their world!?’ Tabitha yelled back. ‘Did they pull this scam on every other planet too!?’ Saa suddenly looked petrified as she checked the new message on her wristcom.

‘It’s the Minister for Interplanetary Affairs,’ she said, clearly trying to hide her nerves. ‘She wants to meet with you.’

‘Now?’ said Tabitha.

‘Now,’ Saa replied.

‘About what I told the reporter?’

‘I’d humbly advise that you apologise for it, Majesty. And stay on the minister’s side,’ Saa said woodenly. ‘Everyone’s looking for a smooth transition for Stormworld into the Ministry. As your aide, that’s my advice.’ Saa stepped up close. ‘Tabitha, it has to play out like this for the ministers, ok?’ she said quietly. Clearly concerned.

‘You would’ve let me agree to it, without a word,’ Tabitha muttered, looking deep into her eyes as the tears came. ‘They’ve got you terrified.’

‘They have it down to a science. Believe me,’ Saa confided sadly, taking Tabitha’s hand. She hesitated then, as if she shouldn’t say what she was about to. ‘Please, don’t go up against them on this,’ she said tenderly. ‘I need to know you’ll be safe. I’m sorry.’ Tabitha watched her leave the penthouse in shocked silence, as if that expensive lounge rug had just been pulled from under her feet.

...I really am just another piece in the game.

47

‘We meet again. The Sky Queen,’ said the blue-skinned minister, with more than a hint of sarcasm. Sipping her drink; gazing coldly. Certainly less agreeable than she’d been in the restaurant earlier. ‘I didn’t think we’d need to brief you on the press,’ she sighed. ‘Not yet, anyway. I thought you had more sense.’ The office was a stark white space. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked the gleaming city. A striking view, but for that smirking suited woman behind the desk. The woman who’d been harping on about her child’s first words during their lunch, and counselling sensitivity for Stormworld’s tragedy, as her small masked colleague had talked solely in profits and perceptions. Now she was eyeing Tabitha with silent, arrogant amusement.

‘I know the Ministry was behind that invasion,’ said Tabitha, watching the woman’s expression. That cynical stare, cutting through her. As if they were both in on some little joke.

‘I must say, that reporter raised another interesting point,’ the minister countered. ‘It’s curious that you bear no resemblance to any other species on Stormworld. Yet you rule its people,’ she said, with a wry smile curling at the corners of her mouth. ‘We’re usually so open-minded about these things. But I have to wonder if that consideration is going to... get in the way.’

‘I’m Sky Tribe’s appointed leader,’ Tabitha replied, assertively. ‘They crowned me themselves.’

‘Indeed,’ the minister purred. ‘Quite the little cult you’ve been growing for yourself. That’s not a criticism, by the way,’ she continued, marking Tabitha’s hard stare. ‘Personally I think it’s very enterprising of you. But you must understand that here in the collective, there is such a thing as lawful procedure. We can’t just have individuals playing god with primitive peoples, and ruling worlds by themselves unchecked.’

‘Primitive!?’ Tabitha snapped. ‘They’re more honest and civilised than any of you bastards!’

‘There’s no need to get angry,’ the minister replied, still wearing that arrogant smile. ‘I respect Stormworld’s culture and the no-nonsense ways of your, ah, people... but I’m afraid that such displays of anger are quite uncommon, for our particular sensibilities. Just some professional advice, for your ministerial career.’

‘I came here to secure a future for those people,’ Tabitha shot back. ‘My old world’s dead. I won’t see another world invaded like that again. I’m not here to play to your sensibilities. People have been dying! How can that not bother you!?’

‘You’re in politics now,’ the minister chuckled condescendingly, sipping her drink. ‘Of course you’re here to play to our sensibilities. And I’m sorry to say, but... people die all the time.’

What. The. Fuck. There it was again. The smile. That look in the woman’s sharp eyes that told Tabitha she was so out of her depth, she didn’t even know it.

‘That reporter asked about the mercenaries’ hardware, and where it came from,’ Tabitha threatened her. ‘What if I tell him the truth, or go to the courts with evidence? What could happen to your empire then?’

‘Well, there’s also the question of where you got your own military hardware,’ the minister parried, with a smile. ‘And what you’ve been doing with that vicious, fire-breathing hardware on a primitive alien world.’

‘I’m protecting those people!’ Tabitha snapped.

‘And I believe you,’ the minister assured her, with that menacing smile. ‘It just so happens that you’ve elevated yourself to considerable power in the process. A world leader, in fact, ruling by might. Oh, that’s not a problem, necessarily... in fact an absolute ruler presents a simpler transition for everyone. Provided you’re still happy to collaborate, of course.’

‘...It was you, wasn’t it?’ said Tabitha. ‘You planned the invasion yourself. You were taking Stormworld by force with hired guns, until we fought back. You realised it was all about to go public, so now you need a puppet on the council to smooth it over. So you can carry on robbing it.’

‘Careful, Majesty,’ the minister replied. ‘The truth can be shown in many lights. Including yours.’

‘I’m going straight to the media, you fucking monster!’ Tabitha snapped.

‘As is your right,’ the minister replied coolly. ‘Though it would be a terrible pity if those mercenaries returned to Stormworld in force, during your absence. It pains me to say that these things can happen.’ Tabitha couldn’t even get her words out, she was so furious. ‘Speak of this to anyone, and it could happen very quickly,’ the minister concluded. ‘...Think of your people.’

‘I’ll kill you,’ Tabitha snarled, clenching her fists.

‘So self-centred,’ the woman tutted. ‘I’ve half a dozen contingencies that would maim your people’s economy for a thousand years. Bleed them dry for eternity. You could watch all that wretched poverty from your prison cell, my legacy, until you finally die weeping. I like that thought.’ The huge doors across the room glided open. A slight, smiling assistant walked in and stood politely at a distance. Tabitha stared in shocked silence; too fearful and furious to speak. One word to anyone, and Sky Tribe could be burned alive.

‘Please escort Her Majesty to her limousine,’ the minister said pleasantly, with a sudden warm smile. ‘She has many preparations to make, in orchestrating Stormworld’s integration with the Ministry.’

‘That’s wonderful news, minister,’ the assistant said brightly, glancing between them happily as she led Tabitha out.

‘Yes it is,’ the minister replied, giving Tabitha one last pleasant smile.

‘Where are my bodyguards?’ Tabitha demanded furiously, as the minister’s assistant escorted her outside to the empty limo. ‘Where’s Saa?’

‘I’m afraid I don’t know, Majesty,’ the assistant replied, at a loss.

‘Where’s Saa?’ Tabitha asked the driver, as she climbed inside.

‘Sorry, Majesty. I don’t know who that is,’ he replied. He wasn’t her regular driver.

‘Just take me back to the penthouse. Please,’ she snapped, as the tension knotted tighter in her stomach. If Saa and her friends weren’t there when she got back, if anything had happened to them... she was going to blow this whole thing wide open. She quickly checked her wristcom for the voice recording; she’d captured the minister’s every word as evidence. The file had disappeared.

‘Apologies Majesty, I’m under strict orders to take you to an urgent appointment,’ the driver replied, as the door slid shut and the limo lifted away.

‘What appointment?’ she demanded. Every muscle in her body said fight. Escape. And she knew what’d happen to her friends, her tribe, if she did.

Tabitha was led down a bright white corridor. She hated bright white corridors. Nothing good was ever waiting at the end.

‘You’ve prepared your speech, I take it?’ said the little grey assistant, scurrying along beside her to tease her hair out in looser curls. He was already being abrupt with her, since she’d refused the dresses he’d picked out and stuck with her outfit from the penthouse.

‘My speech?’ Tabitha replied, stopping dead in her tracks. The whole makeshift entourage ground to a halt behind her. ‘What is this appointment?’ she demanded. She could feel her panic rising. A sudden desperate urge to claw and shock them all away and run for her bloody life. And the fear for her friends that stopped her.

‘It’s your inauguration speech, into the Ministry?’ the aide replied, condescendingly. ‘You didn’t think it might be prudent to prepare some words for the occasion, as a world leader?’

‘I’m not here for an inauguration!’ Tabitha said furiously.

‘Tell that to the billions of people watching live on the breaking news,’ the aide whispered angrily. ‘Either go with the inauguration, or go up against the Ministry. It’s your call.’

‘Fuck the Ministry!’ Tabitha snapped furiously. The entourage gasped; horrified. The aide was silent but for a raised alien brow. ‘I’m not doing this. I’m not going out there!’ said Tabitha, filled with dread. She’d been shoved right into this; signing Stormworld away. A distant audience erupted into cheers, tens of thousands strong.

‘They’ve just introduced you!’ the aide yelled at her. ‘You have to go out there and say something! Go!’ Tabitha studied the alien’s wide staring eyes; watched him sweating with stress.

‘Oh, shit,’ Tabitha muttered, as the cheering applause rose beyond the stage doors. The aide was right. She’d been introduced now; she couldn’t just skip her own speech. Or else. After all... this might be her only way out. Her one chance to tell these worlds the truth.

‘They’re waiting for you! Go! Just go!’ the aide hissed at her. He pushed her out of the soundproof door as it swept open. Tabitha heard a sudden deafening applause as she wandered out into the wings of the stage, hidden from the giant crowd.

‘Her Highness, the Sky Queen of Stormworld!’ the presenter repeated to the cheering audience, glancing over to beckon her out to the podium. Tabitha breathed deep and tried to steel herself; felt her stomach turning in terror. The presenter’s winning smile was fading slightly; he urged her out with a quick stare. Tabitha breathed and walked on, psyching herself up. Except... she wasn’t Tabitha. She was the Sky Queen. She had no intention of being forced into an acceptance speech. By the time she’d cleared the shadow of the stage wing, into the bright lights and deafening cheers, she didn’t even hear them. She strode across the stage sternly, and all but crushed the grinning presenter’s hand when she shook it. She watched him give one last fake theatric smile, waving to the cheering crowd, and exit stage right. Tabitha took her place at the podium in the gathering silence. She studied its blank white surface, searching her thoughts for the right words. A hasty, Ministry-approved script was already scrolling in hologram on the podium’s surface. She ignored it.

‘I’m honoured to stand before you, as the sovereign leader of Stormworld, and I thank you,’ she told the quiet crowd; erupting again into polite applause. It was weird to hear her own voice echo through the arena. All those monsters she’d faced, and somehow this felt more terrifying. Ministers watched closely from their seats in the high boxes; hundreds of them. The four she’d already met were staring from the best seats in the house. Tabitha took a shaking breath off-mic. This was it; the chance to make her people heard. To tell the truth.

‘Stormworld thanks you... but we don’t need your recognition,’ she told the crowd, as the applause died down. All that followed was confused silence, and quiet chatter. ‘The people of Stormworld trusted me to come here, because I understand modern politics more clearly than they do,’ she continued. Finding her voice. Her conviction. ‘Even that isn’t all that much... but I know enough to say what I’m about to say.’ The vast crowd was hanging on her words, strange and unscripted; so unlike the rhetoric they were used to.

‘What the fuck is she doing!?’ the aide hissed at the shrugging entourage backstage.

‘Careful, Sky Queen,’ the wintry First Minister mumbled to itself, in the foremost seats above the crowd.

Tabitha hesitated; she looked around at the silent audience. Suddenly she felt the full weight of the bombshell before she dropped it. But this was her only chance. They can threaten me and my friends. We aren’t afraid to die. This is bigger than us; this is for the billions to come. I refuse to be the one who signed their world away. She knew what her friends would tell her, even if she never saw them again. Be strong, in Fierce-Hope. Lead.

‘Stormworld thanks you for your offer, to be welcomed into the Ministry,’ Tabitha addressed the crowd. ‘But we prefer to remain an independent world. This is our way. The Ancient Way.’ Shocked gossip spread through the audience like wildfire; no world had ever said no before. Journalists up front were straining their wristcoms to the stage, to record every word; some were yelling out questions like this was suddenly a press conference. Tabitha took a deep breath; this was no time to hold back.

‘Stormworld has been attacked, repeatedly, by a mercenary army. Intent on mining gold that belongs to my people,’ she continued. The crowd was a chattering chaos. ‘These invaders murdered my people. They burned our homes to the ground. And they tried to cover their tracks, when we fought them back from our world.’ The audience was wild with gossip. She wasn’t here to start a war; just to fire a warning shot for the ministers. Accusing them directly might get her friends killed.

‘We only want to be left alone, to live in peace,’ she said. ‘My people have the right to develop their own cultures, on their own terms, just like Serenity has. Until they can reach the stars by themselves.’ She saw someone nod in the front row. ‘We have our own wealth; we don’t need the whole galaxy’s. So I’m asking that Stormworld be left to grow, in solitude... and to expect our full retaliation, against any invasion.’ The crowd was silent. ‘We’re a free world, who respectfully refuse any part of the Interworld Ministry. That’s our right, to be free. And we’ll fight to the death to uphold it. Please, leave us in peace. Thank you.’ The audience watched the strange Sky Queen leave the podium in stunned chatter. Tabitha felt her heartcore in her throat. It was a long walk back across that stage, for the shadowed safety of the wings. By the time she was halfway across though, she thought she could hear clapping. Yes; there it was. A feeling, spreading through the turning crowd. By the time she left the stage, more than half the audience were applauding. Cheering for this new world, who demanded independence from the Ministry. The first exception. The Guardian troops watching the stage grew nervous at the rising cheer.

‘I tried to make it easy for you,’ the winter figure sighed quietly, as it stood from its seat high above in the boxes. ‘Have it your way, Sky Queen,’ it said, smiling in amusement. ‘One last chance.’

Tabitha walked quickly down the corridor outside, before she could be escorted anywhere else. She had to find her friends, and make sure Saa was ok. They had to get back to Stormworld, today. She just hoped another invasion hadn’t started already.

‘Majesty,’ said an androgynous voice behind her, echoing down the statued corridor. Tabitha heard the doors lock with a sudden click at either end of the hall. ‘A moment of your time?’ Turning, Tabitha saw the winter figure she’d met earlier. The First Minister. It smiled.

‘Your species is not known to us,’ it said calmly, as it paced down the corridor towards her. ‘But I suspect that the way you are... isn’t the way you’re supposed to be.’ It studied her hard black hands and feet; her bright gold eyes.

‘More blackmail?’ Tabitha replied, as the tall figure approached.

‘I’d rather not,’ it said pleasantly. ‘I’m in the business of mutually beneficial partnerships. Wherever possible.’

‘Open the doors,’ Tabitha demanded, her fists clenching by her sides.

‘We’ve shown you the kind of life you could have here,’ said the minister, with a tone that implored compromise. ‘We even brought your friends and family back, as best we could.’

‘...That memory simulator? That was you?’ said Tabitha.

‘We can give you your body back too, if you like,’ it replied. ‘Your real body. You’ll be able to touch again, and eat again. You miss that terribly, don’t you? It cuts you off, from what you’re supposed to be. I saw the way you watched us today, just... eating. So much longing. Such a simple thing, with such profound satisfaction. Just imagine, dining on delicacies that would make you feel more alive than all the lovers you’ve ever had. And as for the lovers... it’s a very good life here. Believe me.’ The minister was smiling gently. ‘All those things you miss so sorely, you could have them back. And much more besides.’ Tabitha stared into those cold clear eyes, and said nothing. ‘Look. We were so wrong, to do what we did. But we don’t want genocide,’ it said softly. ‘It was a prospecting mission, which escalated far out of hand. If you can find it in your heart to forgive our mistakes, and give the Ministry a chance to make things right – with all the resources at our disposal – then we can surely reach an agreement that benefits everyone?’ Tabitha watched the creature carefully.

‘Why do I have a hard time believing that?’ she snapped.

‘Please, don’t throw this chance away,’ the minister replied gently. ‘Your people stand to gain so much from this. Security, healthcare, education... and good secure jobs, developing the land they know and love, to profit from its wealth and thrive. You’d double their life expectancy, overnight. Give their children a bright new future. You’d be the greatest leader they’ve ever known. Together, we could turn this tragedy into an incredible partnership. We could change the lives of billions, today.’

‘...You make it all sound so easy,’ Tabitha said hatefully.

‘And you make it all so impossibly hard,’ the minister chuckled. ‘Look. The real question is bigger than either of us, or what we want,’ it said. ‘What gives you the right to deny those people’s future? To hold them back, struggling and suffering, for thousands of years to come?’

‘I...,’ Tabitha hesitated, looking for the words.

‘I know what I’d do, in your position,’ the minister added. ‘For your people, and for yourself. I mean, haven’t you been through enough?’ it said, sympathetically. ‘Don’t people believe in making themselves happy, where you come from?’

Where I come from. The words rang in her head; that guilty shard of glass. She’d left her own world to die. If she got back her old hands and feet, her stomach, her heart... she’d lose everything she was. She’d lose her connection with Seven, and Fishbowl, and the sun. Sign away her chance to fight for her tribe. For both her tribes.

I’d lose Stormworld. I’d lose Earth. Forever.

‘Majesty?’ the minister urged her, fixing her with that smiling stare. ‘It’s really not that difficult a decision.’

You’re right, Tabitha told herself. Come to think of it, there’s no decision at all.

‘No,’ she replied, full of fresh conviction. ‘My answer’s no.’ The minister’s smile faded.

‘You’d throw away this chance for a normal life?’ it said quietly, with ridicule in its tone.

‘I don’t want a normal life,’ she replied. ‘I belong with my tribe. I have to keep them safe.’

‘They are safe, under Guardian law,’ the minister replied. ‘Bring your people into the collective,’ it urged her. ‘With free trade established, there won’t be any more invasions. There isn’t a threat. Not any more.’

‘There’s always a threat,’ Tabitha replied, meeting the minister’s stare. ‘We’re Sky Tribe. We fight our own battles. That’s our way.’ The minister watched her, puzzled. Maybe it found her quaint. Maybe it thought she was out of her mind. She didn’t care whether it understood.

‘We’ve given you every chance to reconsider,’ said the minister, its voice suddenly full of gentle menace. ‘Are you sure you want to do things this way?’ Tabitha looked it in the eyes. It was just another politician; all it had was words. It didn’t frighten her; it had no idea what she’d been through. What she was capable of. No one threatens my tribe.

‘Try me,’ Tabitha said quietly, holding its stare. ‘Because one way or another, I swear to god I’ll rip you people apart. Try to kill me, and I’ll just keep coming back. I’ll haunt you. Until there’s nothing left.’ The minister studied her look in silence. For once, it didn’t have something clever to say.

‘...Fine,’ it smiled casually, breaking the tension. ‘Then our brief partnership is at an end, Majesty,’ it said smugly. ‘To our deal, then. Keep your silence about the mercenaries, and Stormworld will never hear from the Ministry again. Speak out though, and we’ll wipe your people out.’

‘And I’ll burn you alive. All of you,’ Tabitha replied. ‘Count on it.’

‘A successful stalemate of mutual graphic violence,’ the minister chuckled. ‘It’s a shame. You could’ve made a good business partner.’

‘...Don’t forget what I said, about the Watchers,’ Tabitha warned it, pushing her feelings aside for the sake of all those worlds. ‘Don’t underestimate them.’

‘Plans are already in motion, I assure you,’ the minister replied, with an arrogant smile.

‘Really. And what does that mean?’ Tabitha demanded.

‘It means that an army of experts is already collating long-range scan data on the alien threat in your home solar system,’ the minister replied, condescendingly. ‘The sheer number of uninhabited planets between these Watchers and ourselves gives us at least two centuries before they reach our outer worlds. We’ve begun modifying multiple super-destructive weapons systems, to annihilate this threat before it could ever reach us. Ensuring the safety and prosperity of some hundred billion citizens, united in peace, under one Interworld Ministry. Are these measures sufficient for you, Majesty?’ Tabitha bit back her anger.

‘...Look, at least let me advise your experts before I leave,’ she replied. Trying her hardest to ignore its arrogance. ‘I know more about them than your scanners can tell you. I’ve fought them. Up close.’

‘We really don’t intend for it to come to that,’ the minister chuckled. ‘If it should come to streetfighting this threat like, ah, unarmed savages... we’ll be sure to give you a call.’

‘You don’t know what you’re dealing with! What they can do!’ Tabitha shot back. ‘At least let me talk to these experts of yours!’

‘Well, we already have more effective measures in place than simply running away to another planet,’ the minister replied, with a barbed tone. ‘Forgive me if your own strategy doesn’t instil the greatest confidence.’ Tabitha ground her teeth, resisting the urge to punch that pale smiling face.

‘...Excuse me, minister,’ she said, seething.

‘Of course. Stormworld must be pining for its self-elected alien dictator,’ the minister replied mockingly. Tabitha said nothing; just walked away furiously down the gleaming corridor. The First Minister smiled and watched her go. The distant doors unlocked with a clack.

‘Tell me, how does it feel to denature an entire race?’ the minister called after her. ‘Hijacking their beliefs? Forcing new ideas on them? ...Showing them a bright future they’ll never have?’

‘I’d sooner see them denatured than destroyed,’ Tabitha shot back, turning to meet its stare. ‘Especially if I can save a shred of their culture from you.’ With that she walked away, and disappeared through the opening door.

‘Oh, Sky Queen,’ the minister sighed to itself, amused. ‘I really had hoped it wouldn’t come to this.’ The wintry figure pulled back the suit sleeve from its wristcom. With the swipe of a screen, it set things in motion. With the touch of a button, it ruined her life.

48

Tabitha had thought the limo was taking her back to the penthouse, to Saa and her retainers. With her shadowy deal done with the First Minister, they’d go home today before anything else could happen. They’d just disappear from this place, and with Saa too if she was in danger. Watching the aircar windows though, she was heading the wrong way.

‘Where are you going?’ she demanded, tapping the dark glass between her and the driver. ‘Hey!’ He glanced back nervously; no reply. ...Alright. I’ve had enough of this shit. Tabitha punched the glass screen to shattered shards and grabbed the yelling driver by the throat.

‘Take me to the penthouse, now!’ she screamed in his terrified face.

‘What the hell are you doing!?’ he snapped, as the limo nosedived and he struggled to level out. ‘You crazy bitch! You’ll kill us!’

‘Just you!’ she growled furiously. Reaching a clawed hand for his terrified face as he fought her back. She leaned in fast and grabbed the controls, trying to turn the car back through the yelling traffic for the penthouse. Or crash them, if it came to it. At least she’d walk away. One way or another, she and her friends were going home.

‘They’ve got your people! Your bodyguards!’ the driver yelled, desperately struggling to control the limo in the flying traffic. ‘They’ll kill them!’ Tabitha was snarling, ready to beat the hell out of him. ‘They’re watching us, on that lens!’ he said, in his strangled voice. ‘They’ll do it, trust me! Get off the controls!’ Growling, Tabitha gave up and let go hatefully. She sat down in the back, angry and powerless; the seat smoked under her sparking hands. ‘You’re insane!’ the driver yelled over his shoulder, steering the limo frantically through the swerving traffic.

‘I’m insane!?’ Tabitha shot back. ‘You work for murdering psychopaths who abduct people, and I’m insane!?’ A message popped up on her wristcom.

Sky Queen.

You are required to attend today’s Interworld Council, at the Ministry parliament.

There you will make a formal refusal of Ministry membership, to complete our arrangement, and will be free to leave.

Do it for your friends, and their families. We trust that you’ll make the right decision.

‘Shit,’ she growled furiously. She didn’t doubt this was a trap; she couldn’t escape it either. She didn’t doubt that her friends’ lives were in danger, and the whole tribe too; the ministers were ruthless. But she had insurance of her own. The truth about the invasion. At least if she went through with this crap, in the public eye, then she and her friends might get out of here alive.

One more round, and that’s it, she promised herself. For my friends. If there was anything else after this, any more appointments, then she’d fight her way off this planet herself. And take the ministers down in flames as she went.

‘I didn’t sign up for this shit! I have a heart condition!’ the driver grumbled angrily, as he rejoined the furious traffic.

‘You’re fine,’ Tabitha snapped dismissively. Hurriedly learning everything she could about the Interworld Council on her wristcom. ‘Just... take me to your psycho convention, so I can get off this planet.’

‘What?’ he replied, confused.

‘Just drive,’ she sighed.

Tabitha was led from the landing pad by armed Guardians, into Serenity’s gigantic halls of power. Escorted quickly to enormous doors, and led through a lobby. Another door, and steps; trying to ignore the watching crowd.

She cleared her dry throat and sipped her glass of water, standing alone behind an ornate pulpit, in the most colossal hall she’d ever seen. The Ministry itself. Exquisite carvings and towering modern gods stretched up endlessly to a vast ceiling, lit by glowing windows the size of tower blocks. All around her in terraced amphitheatre seats, muttering ministers beyond counting held their council of worlds. A figure climbed the steps opposite to the grand speaker’s podium, asking for quiet over the assembly.

Oh shit, thought Tabitha. Please, let someone else be in charge. Anyone but them.

‘Ministers. My honoured guests,’ said the wintry First Minister, smiling to her in the distance. Its voice carried through the staring hall. ‘I’d like to take this opportunity to welcome her Majesty the Sky Queen into our assembly, albeit briefly.’ The figure held out a graceful hand for quiet in the rising chatter. ‘Following the tragic loss of our treasured Arch Minister, may he sleep in the stars, I hereby volunteer to lead today’s council as First Minister, until a worthy successor can be appointed.’ The winter figure glanced around at them; smiling benevolently. Tabitha heard a muted chorus of nodding mumbles and satisfied grunts in the vast hall. Half the crowd looked too bloated and docile to bother standing up, much less offer any opposition.

‘I challenge your position, to lead this session,’ Tabitha replied, cluelessly. Hoping to get an easier ride, and one last parting shot, before she left this world for good. The crowd came alive with chatter.

‘Having rejected your position on this council, Majesty, I’m afraid you have no such right,’ the winter figure cut in pleasantly. Laughter spread through the crowd. Tabitha clenched her jaw. ‘Ministers, it is no exaggeration to say that this assembly has presided over unprecedented economic growth. Bolstered and refined by constructive and passionate democratic debate, to unify our peoples and forge our bonds ever stronger,’ the winter figure continued. ‘But today, it seems our run of good luck is at an end,’ it said sorrowfully. ‘Today, Her Majesty the Sky Queen of Stormworld, must refuse the Ministry’s invitation to join its unified worlds.’ A rumbling tide of disapproval ran through the distinguished crowd.

Keep it short, thought Tabitha, with a hateful glare. Let’s get this over with.

‘But I fear this is a far darker day than any of us could have imagined,’ the First Minister continued dramatically, in the sudden silence. Camera drones watched intently. ‘Certain considerations call into question this woman’s entire claim to sovereignty. And hence, whether she has the rightful authority to decide the fate of Stormworld at all.’ Rumbles of gossip ran through the huge assembly. Tabitha glanced around at a galaxy of muttered conversations; hundreds of hissing whispers.

‘Stormworld’s people crowned me themselves!’ she fired back, silently, into microphones that were now conveniently switched off. Her angry objections went largely unheard.

‘Your Majesty, I must raise the obvious question on many minds in this assembly,’ the First Minister continued. ‘It has not escaped our attention that you bear no resemblance whatsoever to the peoples you claim to lead.’

‘I’m not native to Stormworld,’ Tabitha replied, matter-of-factly, into a microphone crackling to life. Stamping down her nerves. ‘Its peoples appointed me as their leader. They trust me, to negotiate their political position. Something they have little experience with.’

‘And how did you come by this powerful appointment?’ said an old rotund minister across the hall.

‘I won my crown in fair combat. In the Ancient Way of Stormworld’s people,’ Tabitha replied, more boldly. ‘They count me as one of their own. I’ve been named, and recognised as spirit-born. I have the same rights as any to lead them.’

‘Which could also be construed as an act of corruption of their deepest-held beliefs, to manipulate them and further your personal ambitions,’ said the blue-skinned minister. The same bitch she’d spoken to earlier today. ‘Do you deny that your tribe afford you a certain... quasi-religious status?’ she said venomously.

‘That’s their free belief,’ Tabitha countered. ‘I don’t dictate the way they interpret–

‘Do you deny that your ever-expanding following on that undeveloped world might accurately be construed as a cult?’ the woman interrupted.

‘Since when was the Interworld Assembly an arena for public trial!?’ a large scaled creature barked, standing up and clearly indignant. ‘This woman is here to formally refuse her place on the council, so let her get on with it!’

‘I understand, minister,’ the winter figure replied calmly. ‘But we cannot continue until we address this pressing ethical concern, for the collective good! Especially if this woman may be obstructing the will of Stormworld’s people, in joining our worlds.’ Rumbles of agreement ran through the crowd. ‘May I also remind the assembly that we have many fine justices gathered here, to oversee.’ The crowd rumbled with approval.

‘This is also an arena of free speech,’ said an ancient whiskered creature. ‘The Sky Queen is free to defend herself, just as the minister here is free to question her rule.’

I can’t believe I have to defend myself against this bullshit, Tabitha told herself. Open your bloody mouth, woman.

‘These people want to rob Stormworld’s resources, can’t you see that!?’ Tabitha shot back at the assembly, desperate to leave this place. ‘My people crowned me! I came here to learn more about the Ministry, and I’m disgusted with it! I won’t sign Stormworld away to these criminals and their hired guns, and you’ve got no right to hold me here under suspicion!’ A rising tide of chatter swept the crowd.

‘We do if you’re defrauding an entire world, without the proper right to rule!’ a large reptilian called back. Another of the four ministers she’d met earlier. Murmurs of approval ran through the assembly. Tabitha felt her stomach twist in dread; desperate to shout out that her friends were held hostage. Seeing how corrupt this all was though, that could be all it took to get them shot. The winter figure nodded graciously in distant conversation, and motioned to the blue-skinned woman with a theatrical look of concern. The fresh silence hung like a guillotine.

‘Minister, I believe you have a question for Her Majesty,’ said the winter figure.

‘Sky Queen. I propose that you have taken control of Stormworld by force, and rule its people through fear, and religious deception,’ the blue woman told her sombrely. Rumbles of shocked chatter spread through the crowd.

‘What!?’ Tabitha replied, horrified. ‘No! I’d never–

‘So you deny that your biological weapon helped you secure your position as sovereign leader?’ the small masked minister interrupted, with short sharp hissing breaths.

‘He’s not a weapon!’ Tabitha protested. ‘He’s a thinking, feeling being! He’s protected Stormworld’s people ever since we–

‘He aided you in butchering dozens of innocent prospectors! Admit it!’ the reptilian roared.

‘You mean the armed invaders who mined that world, and killed its people!?’ Tabitha yelled. ‘At least get your lies straight! You people are a fucking joke!’ the hall rumbled with sudden disapproval.

‘Do you share your people’s religious beliefs?’ the blue woman asked her, over the rising noise.

‘They’re free to believe whatever they want to, and so am I! That isn’t–

‘And do you deny your use of Stormworld’s resources to build your own alien settlement, to establish your seat of power?’ said the reptilian.

‘That was a shelter, for the people who lost their homes during your invasion!’ Tabitha fired back. Trying to speak like them; project like them. Trying to adapt to this new survival.

‘Do you deny corrupting the indigenous flora with your own alien species, clearly genetically engineered, to manipulate Stormworld’s environment to your will?’ said the small masked minister.

‘Can you deny your part in the death of innocent people?’ Tabitha yelled furiously. ‘The result of illegal mining by a private army, that you’re now trying to pass off as prospectors?’ she watched the masked creature fall silent for a second in the sudden chatter. Got you, you slimy bastard. She didn’t even have a moment to press the point.

‘Your own allegations will be heard in due course, Sky Queen,’ the First Minister replied. Tabitha was raging as her microphone cut out again. ‘But you currently stand accused of the most heinous act of cultural theft and corruption, and forceful occupation, that this council has ever witnessed.’

‘This is not a trial!’ a minister called out somewhere behind Tabitha, standing up from her seat in defiance.

‘The law is ever-present!’ a green creature argued back across the hall. ‘If we can’t bring it to bear in the heart of our government, then why even have this government!?’

‘I for one refuse to squander public money on a second trial when one is clearly underway, to protect the sanctity of our Ministry! And Stormworld!’ a minister declared across the hall. Tabitha felt sick when he flashed his vote-winning smile for the camera drones, to rapturous applause. She felt her whole world crumbling around her. She should’ve stayed in that hut on Sacred Mountain.

Too late now. Tabitha felt her adrenalin surging, as all eyes fell on her in the silence. Adapt. Survive.

‘...If this is a trial, I demand representation,’ she said triumphantly.

‘And in a common-court trial you would have that right,’ the First Minister replied, with a menacing smile. It couldn’t have sounded more condescending. ‘As the leader of an entire free world however, in an interplanetary system of government, it’s... rather expected that you possess the experience in public speech and legal acumen to represent your own actions during a trial.’

‘I say again that this is not a trial!’ the old minister behind her burst out. ‘It cannot be!’

‘A full assembly may bring a trial to session, if deemed essential to the integrity of the Interworld Ministry,’ the blue woman replied.

‘I never agreed to that!’ said the old minister.

‘It was passed by the majority,’ the blue woman shot back.

‘All in favour that the trial be allowed to continue?’ the First Minister asked the crowd. Tabitha watched in horror as a constellation of white voting lights flickered to life through the hall. The contrasting blue lights were few and far between. ‘Very well. The trial continues,’ the winter figure declared, with more than a hint of pleasure in its tone.

‘This is ridiculous!’ Tabitha yelled out. ‘How can people this corrupt call themselves a government!? You’re a fucking joke!’ The drone cameras fixed on her in the assembly’s stunned silence, broadcasting every word. Media channels across the galaxy watched the ratings creeping up.

‘Well, I believe Her Majesty has made her feelings quite clear on this Ministry,’ the winter figure replied. Smiling as the lofty laughter spread through the crowd. ‘I can only apologise on behalf of our assembled worlds that, ah, trial by combat is not a viable alternative to settle the matter.’ Laughter. Applause. Tabitha felt sick. ‘In which I’m sure you’d excel, Majesty,’ it added. Tabitha was too angry to reply, with all the laughter around her. The winter figure, practised and in its element, pounced on her hesitation.

‘Ministers, I will endeavour not to waste your time further on this matter. Time marches on, and there are many more concerns for which we are assembled here today. You have heard the many accusations levelled at this Sky Queen, who stands accused of murder, of cultural theft and corruption, and of the militaristic takeover of a protected indigenous species, in order to gain absolute sovereignty over them. Something she has achieved with frightening efficiency.’ Murmurs of agreement ran through the assembly.

‘That was never my intention!’ Tabitha called out, strangely quiet. Conveniently, her microphones had stopped working again. No one heard her. She turned to the ministers behind her in panic; frantically asking for help.

‘It is my intention, for the common good, that Stormworld elect its own leader. From its own people,’ said the First Minister. Rising applause from the assembly. ‘The finest representative of their proud indigenous race and culture,’ it continued, raising its voice over the growing cheers. ‘In place of this aggressive, deceitful,’ the cheers were deafening. ‘Mercenary impostor!’ Tabitha watched thunderous applause all around her; still yelling her defence soundlessly into the microphones. ‘All in favour that the Sky Queen not be permitted to return to her stolen throne, and instead be placed under arrest, for her crimes against the people of Stormworld!’ the First Minister drank in the applause righteously, pointing an accusing finger in her direction. Playing the crowd’s sentiments like a prodigy. The deafening cheers and the sudden sea of lights carried the vote. The First Minister’s fanatical words dropped like stone.

‘Sky Queen, it is the will of this assembly that you be placed under arrest for your treasonous crimes against the people of Stormworld, and the Interworld Ministry.’

Get out, Tabitha screamed at herself. Now. Before she could turn and run from the podium, the floor beneath her feet paralysed her where she stood. A troop of armed Guardians dragged her away as the cheers of the assembly rose to roaring applause. Tabitha glared, stunned and soundless, as her world came crashing down.

49

Tabitha stared at the blank bright wall opposite in silence, with nothing but the sound of her breath for company. She sat on a basic but comfortable bed in a stark white cell. Head still spinning from her verbal mauling, and so many flashing cameras, and how everything had messed up so royally and turned entirely upside down.

The Ministry didn’t get the answer they wanted. They were never going to let me walk away. How could she let this happen? How could she have been so stupid, to let her friends out of her sight? Sighing, she got up, her pale prison jumpsuit rustling. She walked to the giant window; a wall of glass looking over twin lakes and a pretty park. Presumably there just to torture her. She put her hand on the thick glass wall. Thought about it, and tried a sly punch to see if she could make a crack. She dropped to her knees, gasping at a sudden stinging agony in the back of her brain. Shrill and needling, ringing high in her ears, like a thousand hot pins inside her head. She couldn’t move; couldn’t breathe. The next moment, it was gone. It left her curled on the floor, gasping for breath. Glancing around at her cell.

‘Please don’t hit the walls,’ came a calm voice over an intercom; a circle of speaker dots in the ceiling. The black lens at its centre watched the whole room. Dazed, Tabitha nodded in shock and went to sit on her bed in silence. She stared at the floor and the smooth white walls, built without joins or seams. She lay down on her bed, turned her back on the ceiling lens to face the wall, and pretended to rest. Sprang out a claw to scratch secretly at the plastic-metal surface. That same needling agony gripped her and stopped her breathing. A pain like a candle flame, small but hellish hot, burning the inside of her head. It stopped.

‘Please don’t scratch the walls,’ the calm voice told her. Tabitha lay gasping; clutching her skull as the pain died down.

‘So this is your job?’ she snapped at the speaker dots, sitting up on the bed with her back against the wall. ‘You torture a few prisoners then clock out in a few hours, and go home to play with your kids?’ No reply. ‘Hello?’ There was a calm tone then; a green light pulsing in the wall beside the door.

‘Stand in the circle, please,’ said a pleasant voice outside. There was a light grey dot on the floor, about two feet across, in the corner of her white cell. Tabitha wondered for a second if she could hide in the other corner by the toilet, and jump the officer when he came in, but thought about the lens watching her on the ceiling. It’d punish her before she could lay a hand on him.

‘Miss, stand in the circle please,’ the voice outside advised her. ‘The AI in the ceiling isn’t very patient, I’m afraid.’ Tabitha did as she was told and stood on the grey dot in the corner, facing the rest of the cell. ‘Thank you,’ the voice replied kindly, and the door whispered open. A short old man walked in and smiled pleasantly. Kind pale eyes; green wrinkled skin. Hat and uniform brushed and pressed to crisp proud perfection. When she tried to go for him, to get past, she couldn’t move a muscle on the faint grey dot. It kept her standing stock-still like a mannequin.

‘How are you?’ the guard said warmly, unaware that she wanted to hit him.

‘Incarcerated,’ Tabitha snarled, glaring angrily. ‘How would you be?’

‘Good point,’ he replied, with a wizened smile. He made a quick tour of the cell to check that everything was ship-shape. Tabitha tried to take her chance and bolt through the open door. She couldn’t move a muscle, no matter how hard she strained.

‘Well, you don’t need me to tell you that here’s your bed and here’s your bathroom,’ the old officer told her cheerily. ‘But since that’s my job... here’s your bed, and here’s your bathroom.’ He chuckled. ‘The sink, hand dryer and the toilet flush are all voice activated. So’s the video screen in the wall, opposite your bed.’ It was like he was showing her a futuristic hotel room, rather than a prison cell; it was weird. ‘Oh, and the window there is unbreakable, so there’s no use in trying if you’re ever tempted,’ he said with a chuckle. ‘That’s voice activated too, if you want it to mist up or black out for a bit of privacy. I understand that you feed on sunlight, so we had that window installed specially. Lastly, so long as you just go about your business, and don’t do anything the AI takes to be escape actions, then it’ll just leave you alone.’ He was smiling that kind old smile. ‘Any questions, miss?’

‘Er, no... that’s fine,’ she replied. What the hell was wrong with her? She hadn’t spoken like that to anyone in ages. That was the old Tabitha talking. The civilised, buttoned-down one. Surprising she was even in there any more.

‘Glad to help,’ the guard replied, with a proud old grin. Disarmingly pleasant.

Fearless warrior queen of the mighty Sky Tribe? Tabitha mocked herself. Dark Storm, Antler-Crown and Wielder of the Ghostly Fire? ...I’m a joke.

‘Well, I’ll leave you in peace,’ said the prison guard. ‘I’ll see you again tomorrow morning, and we’ll take a walk in the garden. If you’ve got any problems, just pass your hand over that white circle by the door there, and I’ll pick up the intercom. Alright?’

‘Yes that’s fine, thank you,’ Tabitha replied, in a flat lifeless tone. Utterly defeated. Wow. A few days in civilisation and you’ve gone back to being a little bitch. Why don’t you thank him for his hospitality while you’re at it?

‘Well, see you,’ he said pleasantly, tipping his cap as he left. When the door whispered shut behind him and locked, Tabitha found she could move again. She didn’t even realise at first; it was completely without sensation. Bizarre.

...I have to get out of here.

After endless minutes spent lying on her bed, studying up-close and apathetic the meshed fabric weave on the blanket, Tabitha wandered to the window. She sat on the floor in the corner, slouched against the smooth wall and the glass. Watched white-and-blue batbirds twist and dart like swallows in the world outside. She’d never known so much wild freedom as she’d had on Stormworld. She’d never felt so much dank frustrated misery, now it was so completely taken away.

Things are so fucked up, Mum, she said to herself, her hard black fingers reaching for the missing silk ribbon on her wrist; confiscated with her clothes and personal effects. Sorry for swearing. I just don’t know what I’m supposed to do.

‘Window, mist up,’ she tried despondently. The glass wall turned translucent white. ‘Black out.’ It did as it was told, and the daylight vanished. ‘Clear,’ she tried. It turned transparent again. She studied the wall opposite her bed. ‘...Screen?’ she said. A large rectangle flicked into life. She recognised the look of the space-age internet they had going on here, like the widescreen in her penthouse. The one Saa had shown her how to use. Even after everything, she hoped Saa was ok.

‘Er... news,’ she said, trying to take her mind off things. The screen popped up with the planet’s major news network; some pink-skinned creature chattered endlessly about the stock market. Tabitha stared out of the window listlessly, and watched the alien world go by. Aircars in the far distance, trailing the same straight lines through the sky. Flowing traffic between the towering white buildings, in the city’s grand urban heart.

‘And in other news of course is the gold rush of the century, as terraforming companies clamour for development contracts on the mysterious new planet,’ said the news anchor. Tabitha looked back at the screen. The footage he was talking over made her stomach turn. It was Stormworld, but nowhere she recognised. The region looked too warm, too tropical; but still the same jagged mountains and dull gold trees. ‘The news comes as the planet signs a declaration with the Ministry for Developing World status, welcoming the so-called Stormworld into the federation,’ the anchor continued.

‘Who signed the declaration!?’ Tabitha muttered, feeling sick. No one signed it. They never would. They’re mining on the far side of the world, where the tribes can’t stop them. The news anchor was still babbling on outside her thoughts; his every word made her want to tear down the walls. She watched in horror as camera-flashing footage showed Deep Roots, Barkless and Sea Mist being hauled off Serenity, cuffed and caged and rabidly indignant; loaded onto a shuttle. The footage cut to the shuttle taking off from a spaceport, while a ticker tape scrolled along the screen with the words SKY QUEEN CULTISTS DEPORTED TO STORMWORLD.

‘What!?’ Tabitha whimpered, watching the footage in horror. The news anchor still prattled on over the coverage.

‘It’s expected that Stormworld’s urban development and terraforming activities will begin in earnest following the official inauguration. The date has yet to be confirmed by senior ministers in the coming–

‘Off! Fucking switch off!’ Tabitha screamed at it, burying her head in her hands as the silent screen faded from the wall. Clutching her knees to her chest, she sobbed bitterly in the corner of her cell. She’d failed her people. She’d let the Watchers win all over again; just a different brand. Not black and cold and murderous this time; but smiling, softly-softly and fashionable, as they stole another world away. She had to get out. There had to be some way out of here. She had to tear the Ministry down for this, and do it now. Before Stormworld became just another colony. Before its people lost every scrap of their fire and fearsome pride. All that potential to grow their own culture, on their own terms.

Think, she yelled at herself, as she paced the room beneath the central lens. Fucking think! She felt her anger rise up so burning and sudden that she clenched her fist at the window to hit it. Teeth gritted, she stopped herself when she remembered what’d happen. That only stoked the fire in her, that frustration. That anyone could have control of her again, and lock her away like this... the thought sent her mind grasping for ideas. She stopped pacing the room suddenly when the thought hit her. It was so simple. She’d been sedated before they brought her here, when she’d tried to fight her way out of custody; that must’ve been when they did it. She felt along the back of her neck. Sure enough there was the tiniest bump there, right at the base of her skull. An implant. That had to be the source of that torturous pain; the device that kept her locked in here. With a couple of tense deep breaths to ready herself, she sprang out her claws and dug them into her neck. Trying to pinch at that implant. Screaming in hot frantic agony as the silver blood streamed down her neck and soaked her uniform. Feeling desperately for anything she could pull, to get that implant out. Suddenly the artificial intelligence in the ceiling corrected her. That same scalding scream in her head dropped her to the floor in searing paralysis, unable to breathe.

‘Please don’t attempt to remove your implant,’ the AI told her calmly, and let her go. Gasping and pale, Tabitha caught her breath and clutched her healing neck. She scurried back to her corner by the window like a beaten dog. As far from that staring lens as she could get.

The next couple of hours passed in stone-heavy silence, as Tabitha leant by the window and watched the clouds roll by. Cried. Tried to stop herself. She wiped the tears with her rough black hands until her cheeks were pink and stinging. Tried desperately to think of some way past the implant. Past the AI, and its staring black bump of a lens in the centre of the ceiling. She couldn’t brute-force her way out of here; not in any way she could see. She couldn’t even scratch her way out in secret. The AI just knew, somehow. Like there were sensors in the walls themselves. ...But there might be one thing it couldn’t detect. One thing that couldn’t be implanted. Tabitha’s heartcore soared at the thought of it. She’d just have to wait and see.

‘So I was wondering... could I have a pot plant? Maybe?’ she asked the prison officer during his visit the next day, as she stood on the locking grey circle by the door. ‘Only a small one. Just something to keep me busy?’ she said, smiling. ‘It’s torture, just looking at all the flowers in the park down there.’

‘Ah yes, you’re a plant lover,’ the officer replied cheerily, as he carried out his daily cell inspection. ‘Sorry kid. I’d love to, but we know what you can do with them. It’s a risk factor.’

‘I-I only wanted a little plant. Just anything, to remind me of home,’ she pleaded quietly. Turning on the waterworks for him. ‘You can monitor it on the camera, I swear.’

‘I can’t help you kid, sorry,’ he replied. ‘There are some good gardening channels on the network though, if that helps,’ he suggested cheerfully. ‘Screen, gardening channels,’ he told the wall. The screen faded up silkily and opened tiled windows of several channels in unison. A variety of alien creatures were milling around gardens and biodomes; chatting warmly to camera, or potting up bizarre dayglo blooms.

‘Well, I hope that helps,’ the officer said kindly, looking back at her with an expectant smile.

It really doesn’t.

‘Thanks,’ Tabitha replied from her circle, sniffling, with a gentle smile of appreciation. Keep him on side, at least.

‘Well, your cell’s looking fine,’ he told her happily, as he headed back for the door. He didn’t mention her hitting the glass or scratching the wall, or trying to claw her implant out. Was he not supposed to talk about it? Did he care? ‘See you again,’ he said, as he left the cell. ‘Same time tomorrow. My name’s Kol, by the way.’

‘Tabitha,’ she replied, watching him cautiously. With a smile and a tip of his cap, he left the cell and the door whispered shut behind him. The grey floor-circle let go of her muscles, and she wandered back over to the TV. She tapped one of the tiled channels and it popped open to fill the screen. Thinking, Tabitha stared blankly while the alien presenter chattered in Trade Language about some particular purple foliage. There weren’t any wires around the video screen; it was nothing but a hologram in the wall. Nothing to reach out and touch. She patted a palm against the wall to feel for electric current; the channels flicked and popped open manically at her touch against the phantom screen. Nothing there; no wires. Or they were buried so deep in the wall that she couldn’t reach the current or surge them. Looking around her cell, she climbed on the thin solid bed jutting from the wall, and tried to jump for the lens on the ceiling. Missed. She tried to claw it, or reach out and shock it. It was too far; too high. She leapt from the bed; trying to reach it as she jumped. It was no use.

‘Please do not attempt to tamper with me,’ the AI warned her. Tabitha hunched into a ball to protect herself from the sudden pain. She closed her eyes tight; held her breath. Waited. But it didn’t come. The AI didn’t correct her. It just watched her, up above on the ceiling. Watched her uncurl, and stand up to look at it cautiously. A cold black lens, staring at the animal below it. It already had her trained.

The next morning Tabitha walked laps in a walled circular yard. The familiar officer, Kol, watched her from the corner by the door with a grandfatherly smile.

‘We introduce more activities and social time gradually,’ he explained, as she walked past him again. ‘Based on behaviour. It’s kind of a points system.’

‘But right now it’s obedience training?’ Tabitha replied, following the circular yard around.

‘Orientation,’ Kol corrected her pleasantly. Tabitha smiled agreeably. Her smile dropped as soon as she walked away again, and he couldn’t see. She watched her feet as she walked around the giant circle; one hard black foot in front of the other. The poured flooring was seamless and grey; as grey as that paralysing dot in her cell. She didn’t need to guess what would happen, if she tried anything out here. Up above trees rustled in the wind; lining a circle of blue sky high above her head. When Kol had visited earlier, and surprised her with mention of a walk in the garden, Tabitha thought her chance had come to escape. But there wasn’t a scrap of plant life around her. Not even a grain of soil. The yard was immaculate; clinical. All the plants and trees were set out fussily in curved terraces, high out of reach above her head.

Look, but don’t touch. They knew what would happen if she touched. Though it did look like people could get up there into the gardens, somehow.

‘Could we get up there?’ she asked Kol, as she walked back around. It was worth asking.

‘Sorry kid, I’ve got orders,’ he replied, smiling as she continued her circular lap away from him. She got thinking again, as she paced the yard in her wide circle. She stared at the smooth white wall as she followed it round, searching desperately for ideas as she walked.

‘You said something about social time. So I get visitors?’ she said.

‘It’s a high-security prison, kid,’ he told her. ‘Isolation wing. You’ll get to make video calls soon, and talk to inmates. But no visitors until your first review. Sorry.’

The next day went exactly the same. The next one, and the next. The more all this smooth white and grey became familiar, the less she dwelled on thoughts of grass and dirt. There were times when she’d rage and scream in a fury, and lash out at the world from her cell. Times when she’d take it all out on the walls, when she forgot just how much pain the AI could inflict. And every time, she’d try to tear that implant out. The ceiling lens dropped her shaking before she could.

Mornings were for walking the yard. Kol was with her each time. He’d talk about his grandkids, or a new movie she could try. Telling his stories. There was this painting he’d done on a weekend trip; the colours had run in the rain. He was an amateur, he said, so it was terrible anyway. He told her how someone had bought it from him, with way more money than sense, when he’d passed it off passionately as an abstract. He was laughing himself to tears as he told her; how he’d paid off his aircar with this crappy spoiled painting on scrap wood. Tabitha wished he wouldn’t talk like that, but still she’d listen. She didn’t want him to be a real person to her. She didn’t want to care.

For lunch she’d sit in the sunlight by her giant cell window; she knew the kinds of batbirds by heart. The afternoons were for films and Serenian literature, on her hologram screen. Or deciphering them, at least.

Every failed bright idea about escape made the whole notion seem more futile. She couldn’t learn a thing about Saa or her retainers, despite her fits of rage. She was tempted so often to check about Stormworld on the news. But knowing she couldn’t do a thing about it, despite her constant demands for a call or appeal, even just a message... she could feel herself going mad. In a way it was easier, and much less torturous, not to think about Stormworld at all.

That night, as she sat on the floor by the corner of the window, she saw a small distant light in the park. A torch or something, beyond the prison complex, flashing on and off. Quickly, then slowly. A bright rapid light, and a soft gentle glow. Why did that seem so familiar? Tabitha cried when she recognised the pattern, and put her hand on the glass over the distant light. It was flickering then resting, like that brainwave pulse. Like that mind-melding software they’d tried in the penthouse. Their therapy.

‘Saa,’ she said softly, as the tears rolled down her cheeks.

‘Do not tamper with the glass,’ the AI warned her.

‘I won’t,’ Tabitha replied quietly, taking her hand off the window. Hugging her knees where she sat in the corner, as the light flickered on in the gloom. Tabitha sparked her palm quickly, and hoped she saw it from the park. Wondering if she’d ever see her again.

The next night there was no light in the park, or the nights after that. Tabitha’s worries were eating her alive, and she still couldn’t get a message outside these walls. Practising her Trade Language on the screen’s learning channels, over and over obsessively, could only distract her for so long. Her thoughts drifted constantly to Stormworld and her friends, to the tribe, to Seven and Fishbowl... and Saa.

If anything’s happened to them, I’ll tear this city apart. Tabitha got up and paced, window to door, window to door, just like every time she lost Fierce-Hope. Stoking the fire. Every hard striding footstep put more of the cell behind her, and smoothed a little more gripping tread from that floor. Claws flexing; cleaned and kept sharp. These walls were nothing. Yeah, the Ministry could lock her away. But they wouldn’t take away the fight in her. They couldn’t have her fire. That was one thing they couldn’t control.

The days ran on and fused together in a bland, clinical stream. Nice and orderly and buttoned down. Sickeningly polite. She’d grown used to chaos and change, back on Stormworld. The hunt and the danger, and the big cold wild. Her blunt violent friends, eating and laughing and howling around the blazing Hearthfire. Now there were only walls. Screens. Windows and lights. Both lives felt alien now. Her time on Earth was ancient history; ashen and dead. Now she was stuck in a hard white limbo, somewhere in between.

The next morning was no different. Tabitha made her running laps of the circular yard in silence, despite Kol’s attempts to strike up conversation. She just wanted to enjoy the smell of fresh air while she out here. To feel the sun and wind on her face, and make the most of it while it lasted. She had to stay fit and keep that fight in her, just to spite them.

Walking to catch her breath, Tabitha glanced up at a noisy rustling gust through the biggest tree in the terraced garden, high above her head. What was that, a seed? It was twirling down like a sycamore; blown beyond the garden walls. She watched it drop to the smooth grey floor ahead of her. She didn’t dare touch it, and it wouldn’t stick to her sole. She acted like she hadn’t seen it, and walked on around the yard. Kol stood by the door, a fair distance away; had he seen it? Did he know what she could do with it? She had to distract him somehow, if she was going to pick it up unseen.

How, though? It’s not like I’ve got shoelaces to tie. She had to think. The distraction had to come from him; something natural. A sneeze or something. Wait... that’s it. As she walked towards him on her next lap of the circle, Tabitha forced a wide silent yawn. She blinked and feigned sleepiness, as Kol smiled at her.

‘Didn’t sleep well last night?’ he asked her pleasantly.

‘Too well, for once,’ she replied happily. She walked on around the circle, back towards the seed on the ground. She heard Kol yawn in response, with a sharp in-breath away behind her; glanced back to check and snatched the seed up quickly, before he could blink his eyes open again. She’d done it. It was hidden in her hand. Tabitha finished her next lap of the yard and yawned again, just for good measure, and laughed it off with him. She couldn’t charge the seed as it was though; it’d fry in her hand. She’d have to feed it first, and grow it in secret. Try to change it, expand it, like those moonflowers back home.

‘I think I’m ready for a lie down,’ she chuckled to Kol, as she came back over to the door. ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with me today. I’m exhausted.’

‘Tell me about it,’ he replied, grinning. ‘It’s making me tired just watching you, and I’ve got a long day. No lie-downs for me, I’m afraid.’ Tabitha smiled and watched him fumbling with his wristcom to open the door. Desperate to get inside with her secret prize.

‘You’ll have to give me the seed though, my friend,’ he told her, his smile disappearing. ‘You know you’re not allowed that.’ Tabitha hesitated, caught in the act; she felt her stomach turn as he stared her in the eyes. A long tense silence, broken only by the sound of his laser pistol being pulled from its holster.

‘Don’t make me do this, kid,’ he told her sadly. ‘I will if I have to, so drop the seed. Please. ...I’ll only freeze you to the floor and take it anyway. Drop it.’ Broken, defeated, Tabitha opened her hand and let the seed flutter to the ground. ‘Let’s go kid,’ he told her, holstering his pistol as a gesture of good faith. Watching her carefully as she headed through the door in silence, Kol followed after with his hand still hovering at his belt.

She couldn’t watch TV any more. She couldn’t escape the footage of Stormworld. It was everywhere now, though the Sky Queen stories had been swiftly buried and forgotten. The new world’s rugged looks and unspoiled wilderness were filling up the channels. Its exotic, primeval wildlife had inspired no end of back-to-basics mimicry in this season’s fashion. Every other advert touted hi-tech wonders, finished in ancient raw materials. Wristcoms carved from volcanic glass. Cutting-edge holo terminals set into slabs of wood. Hewn-slate monuments, and alien models photographed in the wild. Rustic this and natural that. Endless streams of eco-pandering from an army of gurus, looking equal parts concerned and self-satisfied, in a shining glut of ads and talkshows. Some of them talked so fondly about their idyllic Stormworld that anyone would think they’d been born there; that its scenic wilderness was incapable of eating them alive. The way they carried on about its precious pristine beauty, anyone would think they had nothing to do with the empire robbing Stormworld blind. Instead, they were the empire’s smiling figureheads. Lauding the virtues of a wild ancient world, while their Ministry turned it into a fucking car park.

‘Off,’ Tabitha growled at the screen, through gritted teeth. Enough. She hadn’t been through hell and back on three bloody worlds just to sit here and rot in this cell. She was getting back to Stormworld. She was sworn by oath to lead them. Those people were strong, and wise, and tough as hell. Tougher than her, and she was superhuman. But there were some things they just didn’t have yet, like a healthy dose of cynicism. A solid foundation of distrust, and Barkless Tree’s drive to question everything. Without those tools, they’d sleepwalk into the next shining franchise of the glorious Ministry, or have it forced on them before they knew it. Worse still if they resisted outright, and started a war in the Ancient Way. The Ministry would massacre them. Seven. Fishbowl. Everyone. One way or another, she was getting back to her people. She was going to break free.

Tabitha went to sleep earlier than usual, and woke before dawn. She stared at the dim rising sun in grim silence. Breathing. Numb.

She gulped as much water from the drinking fountain as she could stomach, then went back for more. She felt the tears coming, even at the thought and desperate indignity of what she was about to do; looked up to the ceiling and blinked them away. She went back for more gulps of water, cold and painful in her full stomach. She thought something over for a moment, an alternative, maybe just to use the tap itself... no, that wouldn’t work. The ceiling lens would see. She had to do it the first way. The way she’d planned. Only at the very last minute.

It was the longest wait she’d ever known. She felt sick. How had it come to this? How could she ever forgive herself, for what she was about to do?

Do it for Stormworld. To protect the tribe. Whatever it takes, I’m going home. She gulped past the lump in her throat. Breathing deep; trying not to think about it. Funny, though. She’d be thinking about this for every day to come. This morning was about to haunt her for the rest of her life.

Her full stomach fluttered nervously when she heard his old footsteps. That cheery tune that he always hummed, first thing in the morning. Why did he have to be so happy? Why did he have to be so bloody nice? She felt numb. She felt sick. Felt like a monster. She was. The black humour wasn’t lost on her; if only it wasn’t so shakingly real. But she had to escape; there was no other way she could see. Her stomach twisted in dread when he knocked on the door.

‘Morning Tabs,’ Kol called cheerily, his voice muffled through the closed door. ‘You are going to love this morning, my girl! It’s beautiful out there. You can feel the sunshine already. Not even a breeze.’

‘That’s great,’ Tabitha replied, her voice shaking. Wiping away a tear.

‘Absolutely, my friend,’ he replied happily. Tabitha had her knees pressed together in desperation, she had to go so badly. ‘Let’s get out there,’ he said, fumbling for his wristcom key for the door. ‘You on your circle there?’

‘Yep,’ she replied tearfully, as the floor locked her like a statue. Standing frozen on the grey dot by the door. Pissing herself. Pushing voltage through her feet to the floor, in a constant lethal current. The piss puddle spread rapidly, conducting her volts across the floor. Her prison guard’s electrocution, ready and waiting and void of dignity, once he walked inside. Maybe then the floor would release her, and she could make a run for it. Or maybe the Guardians would come and shoot her, and she’d revive in the morgue. But that was a long shot. She didn’t know. She just couldn’t see any other way.

‘...Tabs?’ he said, through the closed door.

Just open it, she said to herself. Please, just make this quick.

‘Yeah?’ she replied, pushing the word up. Blinking away her tears.

‘...You sprung a leak in there?’ he said. Tabitha stared at the far wall in sudden shock. ‘There’s water coming out under the door.’ She was crushed. She heard him stepping away from the piss puddle, creeping outside from the door. He knew what it was. Did he know it was electrified too?

‘Tabs?’ he said, wary in the silence.

‘Yeah,’ she replied, blinking her tears. ‘I’m... I had a flashback,’ she told him. ‘To the war,’ she added. ‘Sometimes, I... wet myself, when I think about it. I’m so sorry.’

‘No, no. Don’t be sorry kid. Don’t be sorry,’ he urged her gently, through the closed door. ‘I’ll fetch a female officer, and you can get all cleaned up in the showers. Alright?’

‘Ok,’ she replied timidly.

‘I won’t be long,’ he assured her. She could hear the worry in his old voice. ‘I won’t be long Tabs. Just hold on, and I’ll go and fetch someone.’

‘Ok,’ she repeated, her voice thick with grief. Tears streaming as she stared at the far wall.

‘We can still take our walk though, once you’re all cleaned up,’ he offered, in his usual cheery tone.

‘Actually... I think I’ll leave it for today,’ she replied, as gently as she could. Staring blankly at the floor. ‘I don’t feel so good today. We can go tomorrow, though?’

‘Whenever you like my friend. I understand,’ he said brightly. She could still hear the disappointment in his voice. ‘See you tomorrow then, alright?’

‘Sounds good,’ she replied stiffly, her eyes pink with tears. Trying to force a smile, so he could hear it in her voice. ‘Tomorrow it is.’ Silence outside.

‘Hey. Look after yourself kid,’ he told her, coming closer to the door. ‘It’ll be alright.’ His voice was different though. None of that usual cheer; only deep old warmth and quiet concern. Suddenly, he sounded almost like her dad. ‘I’ll always be here, if you need me.’ She heard him walking off down the corridor, and sniffled quietly.

God, I wish that was true. But there was only one way she was getting out of here. Only one way it was ever going to end.

50

Tabitha walked the yard as usual the next day, stewing in dank grey depression. She felt a sudden light pat on her shoulder, as a wittering batbird crapped on her from the bushes high above. Just in case there was any last scrap of joy left in her that needed snuffing out. Kol couldn’t help but laugh. At least it was a sympathetic laugh, she supposed. He wasn’t being cruel.

‘Shit happens,’ she told him, with a sad smile. He chuckled at that.

‘Shit happens. I like that,’ he replied. ‘Sounds like a motto or something.’

‘It was, back on my world. Earth, I mean.’

‘See, some of these cultures just don’t have a sense of humour like that,’ he said cheerily. ‘Your world sounds like a good place.’ His words cut like a knife.

‘Yeah... it was,’ she replied quietly, lost in thought. How could she just abandon her home like that? What was she thinking? Had she really believed humanity wasn’t worth fighting for? Earth was no different than Stormworld – so did Sky Tribe deserve protection, while humanity didn’t? She felt sick at the thought. She’d left her own beautiful world to those monsters.

‘Hey, you still in there?’ Kol said cheerily, waving his hand at her blank stare.

‘Hm?’ Tabitha replied, snapping out of her thoughts.

‘I said, are you ready to head back in? You haven’t spent long outside.’

‘Oh no, it’s fine,’ she replied distractedly, forcing a gentle smile. ‘I’m still not feeling too good.’

‘Well, not to worry,’ he assured her, with that wise old smile that creased his face up to the eyes. Just like Deep Roots. ‘We’ll head back inside, and I’ll fetch a lady who can get you a clean uniform, how’s that?’

‘Clean uniform?’ Tabitha asked him, confused.

‘One without bird crap on it,’ he said jovially, nodding to the mess on her shoulder.

‘Oh, right,’ Tabitha replied stiffly. Her thoughts were running away with her. All this time, she’d been playing favourites. She’d flown off into the stars just because she could, and left her own race to die. A fresh rotting guilt inside her. Now she was here for life, apparently. No way back to Earth, or Stormworld. No way to save them from their twisted stolen fates.

‘You’re really out of it today, aren’t you?’ Kol chuckled, opening the door for her. ‘Come on. Let’s go back inside.’

Once Kol had seen her back to her cell, and left her with a cheery goodbye, Tabitha didn’t really move. She just stood and stared blankly at the floor, lost in guilt. Resigned to her fate. Stuck here for decades, with some jagged new thoughts to haunt her for life. She’d left two planets to die now, when she could’ve helped both. A knock on the door snapped her out of it.

‘Hello?’ said a woman outside. ‘Tabitha?’

‘Yeah?’ she replied flatly, defeated.

‘I’ve brought you some fresh clothes,’ the motherly voice told her importantly. ‘I understand a bird had an accident on you.’ Tabitha grinned to herself, despite everything going on in her head. The woman sounded so serious about it. As if she was about to die from the bird shit on her shoulder. Back on Stormworld she would’ve brushed off the mothbird crap with her hand, then wiped her hand on something or someone, and that was that. Considering how bland and safe and clinical it was in this place though, maybe this was the most dramatic thing to happen to the staff all year.

‘You’ll have to stand on your circle,’ the woman instructed her through the door, as if she was talking to a young child.

‘Ok,’ Tabitha called back, smirking at how serious this all was. She wiped the slippery shit off her shoulder anyway. ‘I’m on my circle,’ she called through the door.

‘Coming in,’ the woman called back, as the grey circle locked Tabitha in place. This was a real operation. ‘Here’s your new uniform,’ the snow-skinned woman explained, with a look of concern. As if Tabitha wouldn’t have a clue what the folded fabric was otherwise.

‘Thank you,’ Tabitha replied, trying to stifle her smirk at the whole thing.

‘Now change into that once I leave, and I’ll come back to collect the old one,’ the woman explained. ‘Here’s a biohazard bag to put it in.’ A biohazard bag? Seriously?

‘Do remember to wash your hands though, won’t you?’ the woman added, with glaring concern.

‘It’s fine, I’ll wash them now,’ Tabitha assured her gently.

‘Well, just see that you do,’ said the woman, wracked with worry.

‘I promise,’ Tabitha replied. ‘Twice. With soap.’ The woman seemed happier at that, as she fussed out of the room. ‘Oh, there was something I needed to ask about,’ said Tabitha, when she remembered. ‘Do you have any er... um,’ she said uncertainly. ‘My species, we erm... well, I mean the females, we erm... bleed.’

‘...Bleed?’ the woman replied, with a fresh look of dread.

‘Down there,’ Tabitha tried quietly, glancing down. The woman studied Tabitha’s feet in confusion. ‘From our er... reproductive... bits,’ Tabitha added awkwardly. The woman looked even paler.

‘Oh how awful!’ she replied, full of fresh concern. ‘Why?’ Tabitha just stared at her, stifling a smile. Why? What kind of reply was that? How was that ever a question? What did every other woman in the galaxy do? Sneeze some spores politely?

‘It’s just part of our biology really,’ Tabitha explained awkwardly. Like she was apologising on behalf of humanity for the whole terrible affair. ‘What I mean is, I need something to... soak it up.’

‘Soak it up?’ the woman asked her in horror.

‘So I don’t bleed,’ Tabitha explained. ‘On stuff.’

‘...Well, I have some padded bandages, will these do?’ the woman asked her uncertainly. ‘I’ve never heard of anything like this before, are you sure?’ Was she sure? What?

‘I’m sure,’ Tabitha replied, watching the woman’s concern as she laid some sealed dressings on the bed. ‘Those should be ok, thank you,’ Tabitha assured her. The woman just stood there, wringing her hands anxiously. Please, don’t ask where human babies come from.

‘Um... thank you,’ Tabitha repeated, smiling politely.

‘Oh, right. Yes,’ said the prissy woman, coming out of her horrified trance. ‘Yes,’ she muttered again, as she fussed out of the cell. She turned at the door before she closed it, giving Tabitha one last look of sympathy.

‘See you,’ she said uncertainly, as if Tabitha’s periods were a death sentence.

‘Bye,’ Tabitha replied meekly, with a suffering smile as the door whispered shut. Free of the grey circle on the floor, she changed into her clean uniform. Sweetly perfumed with galactic detergent. She took one of the spongy sealed dressings from the bed and opened it up, wondering if they’d actually work. It was then that she realised; she still had bird crap on her hands.

‘Oh, shit,’ she muttered, hurrying to the sink. Something dropped from between her birdshitty fingers, when she cupped her hands by the tap. A tiny rattle in her palm, like a piece of grit. Only when she looked closer, with her back to the ceiling lens, it wasn’t grit at all. It was a seed, carried in the bird crap. A chill shot down her spine. Her way out, in the palm of her hand. She had to hide it, right now. She couldn’t risk rinsing it off in the sink, or pinching it between clumsy fingers to pick it up, only to watch it tumble down the drain. She quickly put her hand to her mouth like she was drinking water, and plucked the seed off her palm with her lips. The vile bitter taste of bird shit, as she pressed the seed between her tongue and front teeth. The foulest thing she’d ever tasted. The most precious object she’d ever possessed.

Tabitha watched TV that night in her usual spot, by the floor-to-ceiling window. Pressed right into the corner, with the wall behind her and the glass on her right. She was watching a comedy. The worst comedy she’d ever seen in fact, with no discernible sense of humour on display. She laughed though. Well, pretended to. A chuckle here; a belly laugh there. Some hearty chortles in the middle for good measure. An excuse to squirm around under the gaze of the ceiling lens, without it catching on. The AI didn’t care how she reacted to comedy; she was just some dumb monkey from outer space. So long as she wasn’t kicking the door or tunnelling out, it didn’t care. Only, she was tunnelling out. Right now. Safe and watered, in the bottom corner of the window by her bum, Tabitha’s birdcrap seed was pressed firm against the corner sealant. Warm and nestled in a padded bandage, soaking in silver blood from a hidden claw-cut on her arm, the seed drank her bizarre electric genes and reached a tiny dark shoot to the world.

Tabitha felt her stomach turn in elation when she glanced down again mid-laugh, for the hundredth time, to check on it. She saw its little sprout there, midnight-black and beautiful. It looked ready. Her heartcore was racing. She’d never felt so nervous in her life, as she pressed a subtle finger softly against it. Feeding it current, until it burrowed into the window sealant. She felt it creaking and growing as she pushed her volts into it; creeping up some hidden gap inside the window frame. Its spindly shoots were growing to inch-thick branches inside the wall, right up to the ceiling. Forcing themselves wider against the window frame. Edging the whole thing outwards with a tiny nerve-wracking split, right up the line of sealant. The slightest hiss of cold night air was blowing against her side, as her creation prised the window gently from the wall. Tabitha pretended to watch the unfunny show, and laughed with the audience. She laughed harder, good and loud, in soaring joyful revenge. She was still laughing when she turned around quickly and forced her way out through the loose window frame, scrambling up the branches outside.

‘Organic matter detected!’ the AI warned loudly. ‘Escape detected! Assist!’ An alarm was blaring from the breached window. Boots came running up the corridor outside her cell. Tabitha barely heard the AI’s blind panic as she scaled the high wall with her claws; a terrifying drop below. She still felt the implant shrilling in her skull, though far less intense now she was outside. All she really heard was the fierce high wind, cold and glorious in the night. Rushing like static in her ears. When Guardian troops appeared at the breached window below and tried to shoot her, she looked down and grinned. She just kept climbing for the stars above; she was reaching the top. Her implant buzzed redundantly, tickling her skull. Her hand found a flat ledge; Tabitha grunted and hauled herself onto the prison block roof. Staggering to her feet and high on adrenalin, she sprang a brickdusted claw and buried it in her neck with a scream. She dug out the implant and tossed it into the night, and ran for dark gleaming shapes on a distant launchpad. Warm silver blood streamed down her back as the stinging gouge healed up. The city lights surrounded her in the distant night; a living painting of glowing skyscrapers. Tabitha hurtled across the gravel roof as the prison siren screamed and echoed across the park. Spotlights flashed past in a frenzy. The smooth glistening shapes on the launchpad came to life. Headlights. Aircars. Tabitha raced for the small fleet as it took off to search for her; running desperately for the last three cars as their engines rose to droning jets. One took off to circle the complex as she ran for them. The next rose out of reach as she sprinted with everything she had. As the last aircar lifted away Tabitha leapt for the passenger door. Her claws shattered the window as she gripped the side and climbed. She scrambled in like an animal and pounced on the shouting pilot before he could shoot. Punched him hard and shocked him out cold. The car dropped from the sky as he slumped forward. Tabitha shoved him aside and grabbed the controls, her stomach twisting with the dive.

‘Shit!’ she growled, terrified, pulling back on the stick to sweep the aircar from the racing ground below. Climbing fast and soaring over the prison complex, Tabitha gasped with relief. She watched the frantic spotlights shrinking away below, and laughed; it just rose up out of her. She’d done it. She was free. Tabitha switched the car’s lights off on the simple dashboard before anything could follow her, and tore off into the night sky.

Miles beyond the city, glowing in the distance, Tabitha set the aircar down in a field with a landing hover. She dragged the moaning Guardian to the ground, and stripped his helmet and uniform for a disguise. She hoped.

‘Where’s the spaceport?’ she demanded of the bronze creature, as she zipped up the flight jacket. He was still groaning in a daze.

‘Where’s the fucking spaceport!?’ she screamed at him. Volts crackling brightly in her raised palm. He was too concussed though; he wasn’t even looking at her straight. Turning back to the city at the sound of a huge ship in the distance, Tabitha watched its glowing engines and blinking lights soar into the night sky. Straight up, racing for the stars. The spaceport.

‘Oh.’

Tabitha shot back for the city, and the blinking starships rising beyond. But there was something she needed, before she left this world behind. She’d never get another chance to save it. She just hoped it was still there.

The penthouse was dark and deserted. From what she’d seen on the news in her prison cell, that her retainers had been shipped back to Stormworld in cuffs... they hadn’t gone quietly. There were still faint bloodstains in the lounge.

I hope they’re ok. Saa too. She’d never bothered to ask where she lived, or how to find her. Every contact they’d had was by wristcom, or via the limo, and now she had neither. But Saa’s life wasn’t at stake; not like the tribe. She couldn’t afford to get caught again. Tabitha crept on down the hallway, trying desperately not to disturb the apartment’s AI.

‘Welcome home, Majesty,’ came its cold clear voice around her. All the more sinister now, after her time in the cell.

Shit, Tabitha said to herself, as the lights flicked on around the penthouse. She ignored the AI and rushed into her bedroom.

‘Majesty,’ the smooth voice insisted. ‘Your fugitive status prohibits me from assisting you. I have already notified the authorities of your presence. They are arriving now. Please do not resist arrest.’

‘Fuck!’ Tabitha growled. She stripped and grabbed her alien catsuit from the wardrobe, relieved to find it there, and let it fit itself around her as she left. She ran back down the hallway for the lounge, through the open glass wall onto the landing pad outside. A laser shot tore through her shoulder from behind and dropped her screaming. Guardian troops moved in from the front doors, spreading into the lounge as the fugitive staggered and ran.

‘Down on the ground!’ one yelled at her, their rifle aimed. Tabitha sprinted for the aircar and saw a Guardian scaling the walkway ahead of her. Before he could pull his gun she stunned him; put him on the floor with a crackling punch. Shots flashed and burst all around her on the landing pad; she didn’t stop to look back. She threw open the aircar door and scrambled in, mashing every button desperately before she found the blue switch to launch it. Bright lasershots cracked and zipped into the bodywork around her as she hovered the car off the pad. A pair of Guardians running down the walkway shouldered a fearsome-looking cannon. Too frightened to think, Tabitha crunched the controls forward and tore off into the night sky. The cannon below blew a thundering hum; a bolt of light burst past and punched a burning hole through an office block. Tabitha left the tower building behind, and suddenly the sky ahead was an ordered chaos of traffic. She was speeding for vehicles flowing in line. Watching screaming families in the aircar windows as she hurtled towards them. She pulled back on the stick with a terrified gasp and shot into the sky above it all. Were the Guardians following her? She couldn’t see anything behind. The distant glowing spaceport bustled at the far side of the city; something huge was taking off right now. Some gigantic passenger spaceship, climbing for the clouds. Sudden lasershots screamed and burst into the car from behind; a pack of staring drones on her tail. Guardian aircars watching behind them, following at a distance. A flurry of shrill sparking shots machine-gunned the bodywork. Tabitha jerked the controls and sent the aircar barrelling off in a wild spin; the drones dived after her. The supercity whipped by in a shining white blur as Tabitha pushed the aircar to top speed. Twisting past buildings. Ducking walkways full of screaming passers-by. Dodging traffic she barely saw before it rushed up ahead. Still the armoured drones tailed her, screeching laserfire. Racing in close and ramming the car from behind. More shots pummelled the bodywork, and sent the whining aircar diving in a trail of fiery smoke. Hurtling for the streets and buildings below.

‘Get the hell away from me!’ Tabitha yelled back at them, wrestling the controls to drag the aircar up over the looming city. In the corner of her eye she saw a white blur rush up on the right. A boulder of a drone rammed the aircar hard from the side, crumpling the door and shattering the window. It pulled away and rammed again with a violent crash, hugging the car to push it off-course. Tabitha yelled and grabbed its mounted gun that crushed her. She shocked it screaming until the drone sparked and cracked, and dropped from the sky like a flaming comet. Down below people stopped and stared in the streets, and ran screaming. The dead drone roared down between buildings and hit the road in a booming glass-shatter fireball.

Tabitha had to blink and squint at the rushing air through the broken door, straining to see where she was flying. The drones were swarming after her, pounding the aircar with screaming laserbolts before she could dodge away. The beaten car was struggling; its glowing engine stalling and recovering as it veered wildly. She was almost there; the spaceport was up ahead. A vast sprawl of runways and terminal buildings. But she could already see blinking lights and sirens gather at the entrance far below; the runways too. She couldn’t land. Cursing, Tabitha punched the accelerator and hurtled on above it, rushing up on a climbing starship as it broke through the clouds. The Guardian aircars were right on her tail, rattling shots through the shaking bodywork until she vanished into the clouds. She was surrounded by thick mist now, but where was the starship? It rushed suddenly from the wall of cloud behind her. Jerking the controls, she missed it narrowly and felt her stomach twist. Lasershots pounded the dying aircar; sparking flames sprang from the dashboard as the fire spread. Alarms were blaring as the engine stuttered and failed. Sudden deathly silence, but for the rushing wind. Tabitha dragged the slowing aircar closer beside the passenger ship, panicking, and drew level with the giant wing. Before the ship overtook her, and before she’d even thought how stupid it was, she was out of the door and falling. She smacked down on the wing and sank in her screeching claws, tearing scratches down its metal skin, before the starship’s drag could pull her clean off into the sky. She held on for dear life as the aircar fell away in flames and blew like a bomb. She couldn’t breathe; her catsuit helmet popped up to cover her face. Gasping in relief at her air supply, she felt the starship’s engines rumbling and flaring; leaving the shining city far below. The Guardian aircars were tailing, but falling behind. They couldn’t fire on her now. They couldn’t keep up with the starship either, judging by their shrinking shapes in the clouds below. She’d done it; she was finally free. But her relief was short-lived. The thundering starship climbed like a rocket; frost spread across her catsuit. The atmosphere was fading now, from blue to black up above. They were heading for space; for another world out there. If this thing jumped to lightspeed, she was dead.

51

The starship climbed out of the atmosphere, roaring into the starry void. Its thundering jets faded away to flaring silence. Tabitha’s outfit had shuddered and fleshed into a spacesuit, sealing her away. The pinprick stars glided slowly by. Everything was a sudden black peace around her; Serenity’s vast bright curve shrank away behind. She clung on and floated weightless in space. Frantic. Punching and prising desperately at the smooth giant panels for some way inside the ship, before it jumped to lightspeed. Wait – over there, further down its side. A yellow symbol; some sort of caution sign. Tabitha clawed across the panels soundlessly. Panicking, she grabbed at the small sunken lever in the ship’s bodywork, wrenched it down with a silent crunch, and a hidden door crept open beside her. Atmosphere whipped out in a pale wind as Tabitha dragged herself inside the airlock. She slammed her palm on the button inside and shut out the gaping dark. Gasping in relief. There was sound in here; jets of air hissed back into the airlock. A white symbol pinged over the door, telling her it was safe to breathe. A warning buzzer was shrieking as she pulled down her helmet into a collar. When a weightless attendant appeared at the opening door and stared at her in shock, Tabitha pushed herself over and stunned the slight grey woman with clicking volts before she could sound the alarm. She gave up trying to figure out the control panel and just punched it into sparking scrap, until the airlock buzzer gave up and died.

A sudden jolt slammed her back against the wall. Outside the porthole window the stars were streaming lines, like glowing rain. They’d jumped to lightspeed. Looking around in a rush, Tabitha saw a carpeted panel in the floor by her feet. She lifted it away and slipped down inside the gap, pulling it shut above to cover her tracks. There was barely three feet of crawl width down here. Floating past endless humming conduits, Tabitha had never felt more energised. She felt her body drinking the massive voltage all around her, spurring her on into the ship’s buzzing metal guts. No one would find her, way down here; she refused to be found. She had to get back to Stormworld. That was all that mattered. For now though, all she could do was hide until this ship reached wherever it was going; another alien world. It didn’t matter. She’d catch the next ship, and the next. As many as it took to get back to her tribe.

A tremor told her that they’d dropped from lightspeed. A few minutes more and the fuselage beneath her felt much warmer.

Must be re-entry. Gravity dipped her stomach and dropped her from weightlessness, as her cramped metal world descended. Another few minutes and the engines were droning massively; the ship was slowing. Levelling out. She heard rushing ground, whipping by beneath her. The ship was landing. Tabitha crawled desperately for a sudden patch of daylight up ahead, as the ship’s huge landing gear whirred and extended. Dragging herself on through the crawlspace as the giant ship touched down.

As the starship slowed to a hovering taxi on the alien runway, Tabitha clawed her filthy way down through the open undercarriage. She watched the ground rolling past, whispered a string of curses, and jumped down with a painful tumble. Dragging herself up, she sprinted away from its deafening engines; clearing the runway to leap on a cargo truck hovering past. It was heading for the main terminal. Should she sneak inside? Find a route back to Stormworld? It wouldn’t be that easy, though; the new world was so-called protected. It wouldn’t be on the maps, let alone the flight schedules. Besides, the Guardians here would know her the second she showed her face. Tabitha leapt rolling to the ground and ran for a nearby hangar. Some colossal cargo ship was edging out from the opening doors; she barely dodged its crushing hover-gear as it rumbled overhead. What should she do? Jump the hovering undercarriage and climb inside, just to get off this strange world? Or would it take her right back to Serenity? She’d have to find something easier to board, she thought, as she jogged clear of its deafening engines. Something blasted a warning behind her. Tabitha spun around in shock; a small ship smacked into her and threw her over the terrified pilot in the cockpit windows. She crumpled on the roof in agony; clawing for a grip as the engines raced and the ship climbed into the air. Tabitha beat and screamed at the side door from the roof, until the shouting panicked bodyguard had no choice but to help her inside. A well-dressed VIP was yelling at her furiously from the ship’s compact lounge; his wife was screaming beside him. When the door hissed shut and the shouting bodyguard tried to restrain her, Tabitha shocked him to the floor with a crackling thump.

‘What the hell are you doing, y-you crazy bitch?’ the thin green pilot yelled back at her, reaching for an earpiece to radio in. ‘Why did you run out in front like that!? I’m putting us down!’

‘If you tell anyone I’ll kill you!’ Tabitha screamed at him, rushing in to clutch his throat desperately. Her other hand was raised and sparking; claws out. ‘Drop it!’ the terrified pilot pulled the earpiece away and tossed it down. He quickly steadied the sleek ship as it climbed through the clouds. The rich couple were still screaming in the back; the bodyguard was still a limp heap on the floor.

‘W-what do you want?’ the pilot said nervously, as Tabitha lowered her clawed hand and let him go. ‘Hey, you’re the Sky Queen!’ he mumbled in shock. ‘You’re on the newscast!’

‘Take me where I need to go, and I won’t have to hurt you,’ Tabitha growled menacingly. ‘Understood?’

‘Ok. Ok,’ the pilot replied stiffly. ‘Where?’

‘Stormworld,’ she said. The pilot laughed nervously.

‘Stormworld?’ he replied. ‘Seriously?’

‘Yes,’ she snarled. ‘Is there enough fuel?’ He seemed amused for a second at the question; he glanced up to see if she was joking.

‘It’s a fusion drive. Of course there’s enough fuel,’ he replied, as if she was an idiot. ‘But I don’t know where Stormworld is.’

‘So who does?’ Tabitha sighed angrily.

‘It’s not on the maps yet,’ he shrugged. ‘No one but the Ministry knows where it is. We just hear about it on the news. I mean... I can take you to The Rim. You might find someone there who knows where to go.’

‘No!’ the VIP barked in the back. ‘No fucking way are we going to The Rim! I’ve got a show to get to!’ Tabitha glared at him from the cockpit.

‘I’ll throw you out of that door,’ she warned him. ‘Don’t start.’ The man promptly shut up and looked away. His wife hissed frantic whispers at him to stay quiet.

‘We’re leaving the atmosphere soon,’ the pilot told her nervously. ‘You might want to belt up. I-if you want to, I mean.’

‘Good,’ Tabitha replied shortly. ‘And if you do radio the Guardians about me, I’ll kill you.’

‘Don’t worry, I’m not playing the hero,’ the pilot chuckled nervously. ‘Anyway, these two aren’t exactly straight-laced, where the Guardians are concerned.’

‘Hey, shut up!’ the VIP barked in the back. Tabitha watched the pilot carefully.

‘Trust me,’ he told her, managing a nervous smile. ‘I get paid plenty to keep my mouth shut. And I’d like to carry on being paid to keep my mouth shut. I’m very good at it, by the way.’ Tabitha studied his thin face for any hint of a lie. ‘Seriously, I’m making a fortune flying this thing,’ he assured her. ‘But I don’t want to die for a job. I’ll do whatever you want.’

‘Huh. That was easy,’ Tabitha mumbled, pleasantly surprised. She settled down in the empty co-pilot seat to watch the stars streaking by.

‘Well, some people happen to like not dying,’ the pilot replied, loosening up a little. ‘Especially if it’s someone like you.’

‘Someone like me?’ said Tabitha, turning to him. ‘What does that mean?’

‘The Sky Queen? War god of the savages?’ he chuckled. Wiping sweat from his green face with a shaky hand. ‘You’d skin me alive. I’d prefer that you didn’t.’ Tabitha watched him for a moment, and looked away without a word. The silent VIPs stared in terror. She wasn’t going to argue against a myth that useful. ‘It’s a great story for my kids, anyway – flying the Sky Queen halfway home to Stormworld,’ said the pilot. ‘Kids I’d really like to see again by the way, if you don’t mind.’

‘Finally. Someone in this galaxy with an ounce of sense,’ Tabitha muttered, watching the stars begin to blur as they raced for lightspeed.

‘What’s an ounce?’ he said.

‘...Never mind.’

52

Aelu shivered in her usual doorway. She watched the chattering plant workers walking past, indifferent to her. The sunset sky was turning deep nocturnal blue over dwindling orange. Cluttered up with domed factories and depressing chimneys, huddled like dealers. Vomiting smoke.

She wished to the gods that she’d kept all those old coins now, since the galaxy had shifted to digital credits. You couldn’t beg for money that didn’t exist. Some days she got so hungry and lightheaded, she felt like she was touching the gods themselves.

‘Spare a little?’ she said croakily, eyeing a man’s hefty sandwich as he walked by.

‘Sorry, I’m real hungry,’ he chuckled pleasantly, digging back into it as he walked on. ‘Long day. No lunch,’ he called back guiltily, with the fake friendly laugh of well-meaning people. The kind of laugh she’d made, once upon a time. At least rude people had the decency to be straight with you, and not get your hopes up. No. Leave me alone. Piss off, junkie. Sighing as she watched him go, and trying not to think about that giant sandwich, Aelu clutched her damp-stinking scarf closer. She wrapped it tighter around her neck, to keep out the chill of the growing night. She pulled in her blankets and sleeping bag tight, coughing endlessly, and watched the world walk by. The nights were bloody cold here.

Oh, she’s a wonderful woman. Raia’s blessed, she’s such a loyal wife. That girl’s a pillar of the community. The gods are smiling on that one. To think, people actually used to say things like that about her. What was it they said about her these days? Well... no one said anything about her any more. She slept on the streets; she was invisible. Crazy Jai. That’s what they called her now.

‘Don’t even have my real name any more,’ she muttered to the flea-bitten ratroaches, gnawing something on the pavement close by. Hiding out here on Eitse, this alien world in The Rim, she was Jai. Haggard, homeless and hollow-cheeked. She’d bleached her skin and burned her old clothes, and life on the streets had aged her. No one could ever think this skinny pile of rags had killed anyone in the mob. Or been a well-off mother and a housewife, for that matter. She wasn’t Aelu any more.

‘Hey. You lonely?’ she asked a sullen man, his shoulders hunched as he walked by. ‘...You don’t have to be,’ she tried.

‘Leave me alone,’ he mumbled at her, walking on faster. Aelu sniffed her runny nose back and turned away to study the street. Most people crossed over when they saw Crazy Jai. They didn’t want the hassle. There were rumours about her; where she’d come from and what she’d done. Why she wouldn’t get in with the gangs here, or take an empty Guardian cell for the night just to get warm. People said all kinds of things about her. None of it close to the truth, thank the gods. All she had now was her faith, and even that was stretched these days. She prayed to Mercy all the time. She prayed to Strength, and Luck, and wondered if they’d ever answer. Or maybe they had. She was still alive, after all. Aching in the cold, she sat back in her doorway and hugged herself tight against the night.

She’d nodded out; she always knew when she’d nodded out. She always woke up more achy. Colder and stiffer, and shaking for a hit. She pulled her stale sleeping bag tighter into the doorway, to stop it soaking in the growing rain.

Aelu tutted at the sky; the rain was only getting worse. Maybe she’d sneak into one of the darker bars tonight, and see how long her luck held out. Great if she could get a drink out of it. Maybe some lonely depressed cargo pilot, light years from home; too smog-poisoned to smell her or too drunk to care. Yeah, a drink would be good. Better still if she could score. Whatever uppers, downers or good-all-rounders she could get her hands on. She wasn’t fussy these days; just anything to take her outside herself. She tried not to think back to all the things she used to have. A husband; a son. A nice home, on a beautiful world. That didn’t even feel like her; not now. Like it’d happened to someone else, an ancestor maybe, a hundred years ago or something. Best of all, she’d done this to herself. All her self-righteous honour and vengeance hadn’t worked out like she’d planned; she hadn’t a bloody clue. Her son was still dead, and his killers were still out there. All she’d managed to do was lose Raia, and become a wanted killer herself.

He was right, she thought, dwelling on her husband. She watched raindrops plinking circles in light-rippling puddles; staring wearily into nothing. I should’ve just grieved for our son, and let it go. Gods, what have I done?

Wiping her runny nose with a filthy coat sleeve, she glanced up as a small beautiful ship droned overhead. It was gleaming chrome, sweeping and elegant; it couldn’t have looked more out of place. The streetlights and glowing bar signs reflected and warped in its smooth bodywork, as it swept by for the spaceport. She’d grown so used to seeing the beat-up mining ships thunder overhead that she’d never expected to see anything else. But there it was... a shining private craft, like the kind celebrities jetted around in. What was it doing out here? Who was in there? Were they coming out of the front terminal? Could they give her enough change to score, maybe? Aelu staggered to her blistered feet, wrapped up her blankets and hurried out in the rain with fresh energy. She had to get to the run-down spaceport, and see who was leaving that ship. She had to know if they were rich and kindhearted, and willing to give her the price of a meal. They didn’t know her like everyone else here. It was worth a shot.

53

Tabitha pulled her collar up into a breather helmet as she left the ship. It’d been stupid not to hide her face, ever since she’d escaped the prison. She couldn’t afford to take any chances; not now the entire Ministry was looking for her. Even on this far-flung world in The Rim.

What a dump, she thought, as she left the dim aging spaceport. Looking back, she watched the gleaming starship take off swiftly beyond the terminal. What had the pilot called this planet, Eye-tsa? Eitse? This place was hard, cold and industrial; sewer grids poured steam under a rainy night sky. Serenity, it was not. Hard hurried people of every shape and colour bustled past on the puddled street. Quiet and coughing, shoulders hunched, as they poured from plants and factories for damp tower-block homes.

Under the bright harsh streetlights, past stinking streetfood vendors and shuttered-up shops, a single sign glowed a little more inviting on the busy main strip. A bar, from the looks of it; as good a place as any to ask about getting to Stormworld. The rest of the high street was mostly shuttered up, or rusted and dead-windowed in vintage ruin. Probably beautiful once, under all the peeling paint and caked-on grime. She’d seen this kind of place where she grew up, once upon a time. All the grand wealth of industry rotting away, once the plants shut. Nothing fell from grace like a factory town. Tabitha glanced around quickly, and walked off down the busy street for the bar. She didn’t see the ragged figure tailing her through the crowd.

The alien doorman was a scarred monster, cast in black shadow and harsh light from overhead. An eight-foot brute. Giant arms crossed, standing outside the doorway in the rain, like he enjoyed it.

‘Evening,’ Tabitha tried uncertainly, as she headed for the door.

‘Hm,’ the giant rumbled, lost in thought in the pouring rain. Scratching his chin with a massive shovel of a hand, as he nodded her inside. ‘Hey,’ he said absently, in a big deep voice.

‘Yeah?’ Tabitha replied in the doorway, her stomach knotting nervously. Does he recognise me, from the news?

‘Did you come off that shiny new ship?’ he said.

‘Er,’ Tabitha replied, caught off-guard. ‘...Yeah?’

‘For this place?’ he added.

‘...Yeah,’ said Tabitha, uncertainly.

‘Why?’ the giant wondered, looking around at the rough rainy city. ‘S’your business, anyway. Go on in.’ He turned back to watch the bustling street, and that was that. The pale hooded figure following Tabitha took a side alley, before the doorman saw her coming. She tried the bar’s back door and snuck inside.

Tabitha sat back at a table in a shadowed corner of the bar, and pulled her fleshy black helmet up a little to sip her drink. She tried to relax, finally, and breathe a little deeper. The place stank of sweat and spirits, and whatever that insect-looking man was smoking by the gloomy games tables. Tabitha glanced around the place for anyone who might know about Stormworld, or how to get there. She watched three drunk patrons in the centre tables, talking about someone who’d lost an arm on night shift. Joking that he’d never used it that much anyway. Talking about putting some of their wages together for his family, until he found new work. A widescreen over in the far corner showed a rolling newscast on mute. Footage of the Sky Queen’s prison break on Serenity. Tabitha looked away quickly and sipped her fiery drink, sitting back in the shadows.

‘Is this seat taken?’ said a hard-looking woman, rainsoaked and underfed. She stank.

‘No, have it,’ Tabitha replied dismissively. She thought the staring woman meant to carry it away to another table. She hadn’t expected her to sit down, looking around shiftily.

‘So... do you have anything?’ the woman asked her candidly, in a quiet tone. She watched Tabitha’s dark featureless mask staring back in silence. ‘Anything I can use?’

‘I’m not a dealer,’ Tabitha replied shortly. ‘Get away from me. Before I hurt you.’

‘I was just curious,’ the woman replied, scratching her arm. ‘Rich people don’t come out here. Not unless they’ve got stuff to sell.’

‘What makes you think I’m rich?’ Tabitha replied coldly.

‘You came on that fancy ship,’ the woman shrugged, sniffing hard at her runny nose. ‘...Can you spare a couple of credits? Just for a drink? Please?’ She was scratching her arm again, too quickly. Looking around the place, too fast, like she was waiting to get caught. ‘Or just something to eat? Something to eat? I don’t have anything to eat.’

‘I don’t have any money,’ Tabitha replied. ‘Seriously, leave me alone.’

‘Just a couple of credits,’ the wiry woman insisted. ‘Just a drink. Then I’ll leave you alone. Just a drink.’

‘Piss. Off,’ Tabitha snarled, clenching her fist on the table. It wasn’t a good idea to start sparking her hands in here. No point hiding her face if she was going to show her abilities to everyone in the bar.

I just need to find someone heading for Stormworld. A miner or something. Finish the drink, and leave.

‘I only need something to steady my nerves,’ the ratty woman persisted, with desperation in her eyes. ‘Just, you know, something to help me sleep. Help me sleep.’ The alien looked like she needed a strong coffee and an intervention, never mind sleep. It was the way her strange dull eyes kept flicking around the bar, like someone was after her. The longer she watched her, the more Tabitha felt her own tough act start to crumble. The woman was in pain. Like she had nothing else to live for but her next fix. As wrong as it felt to her, Tabitha sighed and pushed her drink across the table for her. It wasn’t like she was paying for it anyway. She didn’t have a credit to her name.

‘Oh, bless you. Bless you,’ the woman replied happily, completely out of character.

‘That’s alright,’ Tabitha replied quietly, uncertainly. Watching the hard scrawny woman like there was someone else hiding beneath. Thinking it over. May as well ask. ‘Look, I need to get somewhere,’ Tabitha told her quietly. The woman seemed much more relaxed all of a sudden, now she’d gulped down half a strong drink.

‘Where?’ the woman replied shiftily, glancing away like she was being watched.

‘...I can’t say,’ said Tabitha. She couldn’t tell the woman where; no one could know who she was. She could’ve kicked herself. She really hadn’t thought this through.

‘So, you want me to help you get there?’ the woman replied.

‘Yeah,’ said Tabitha, as surly as she could.

‘But you can’t say where there is.’

‘...No.’

‘Well, good luck with that,’ the woman sighed indifferently, draining her glass. ‘Thanks for the drink.’ Tabitha heard a metal click down beside her, in the shadows. A gun. ‘Give me everything, princess,’ the woman told her quietly, with a hard stare. ‘Put everything you’ve got on the table, and walk away. This’ll blow a hole right through you. A big one.’

‘...I can handle that,’ Tabitha replied. She sprang up from her chair and burst the woman’s nose as the table and glasses crashed down. Sudden silence in the bar as everyone turned to watch. When the haggard woman staggered to her feet and hit her right back, suddenly the crowd was cheering them on. Tabitha took another hard punch and staggered back into a busy table with a clatter. The group she’d crashed into just laughed and shoved her back into the fight. Already she was hunched up and blocking hits as the woman threw one punch after another, trying to floor her. Damn, she was fast. Strong as she was, Tabitha couldn’t throw one in that connected; it was like the woman saw them coming a mile off. She just had to keep her hands up and hope the bitch would tire out. I wish I could just stun her in front of everyone, or claw her apart. It’d be so easy. But it wasn’t worth being recognised. It wasn’t worth getting caught.

‘This could’ve been nice and easy,’ the woman growled breathlessly, picking up her gun off the floor. Tabitha rushed in close to wrestle her arm away before she shot her. The gun thundered and punched a hole in the distant wall, lightning-bright and deafening. The crowd was yelling, ducking down and piling out of the door.

‘Hey!’ the bald old creature roared behind the bar. Tabitha finally floored the woman with a solid crack on the jaw.

‘Fish! Get these two out of my fucking bar!’ the old man yelled.

‘Yeah,’ said the doorman, in his deep massive voice. He stooped just to fit through the doorway; his heavy footsteps were creaking the floor. A solid ton of hard-labour muscle.

‘We gonna have a problem?’ said the giant amphibian. Tabitha froze up. She didn’t have time for this shit. She just had to get off this world, and back to her tribe. Besides, any more trouble and he’d probably just call the Guardians to come and arrest them. Carrying on suddenly seemed like a very bad idea. The homeless woman was hell-bent on fighting though; she staggered up snarling and laid into her again.

‘Alright,’ the giant rumbled wearily. He grabbed them up like they were dolls, and hauled them yelling and flailing out of the door.

‘Listen, just cool it,’ he said outside, strangely calm, with a thundering fatherly tone. ‘You, go that way,’ he told Tabitha, nodding up the street. ‘And Jai, piss off. I don’t want to see either of you again.’ He shoved the ragged woman away roughly; she flipped and laid into him. The giant growled but hardly flinched. Raging, the woman pulled her gun on him.

‘Not a good idea,’ he advised her, and shoved her to the street to kick her gun away. He pinned her screaming and struggling with his foot, and whistled over at two Guardians down the end of the bustling street. Waving them over with a giant muscular hand.

‘Actually, you stay here too,’ he rumbled at Tabitha, grabbing her before she could slip away. Shoving her down on the ground. ‘Something about you I don’t like.’

‘Let me go,’ she threatened him, gripping his arm. ‘Now.’

‘You’re their problem now,’ the giant replied, watching the two Guardians shove their way up the busy street.

‘Get off me!’ Tabitha yelled, and shocked him. The giant froze up and shuddered at the current; he looked like he was having a heart attack. People were staring and chattering; wondering what the hell was going on. When Tabitha let go, she’d never seen anyone so pissed off in her life.

‘Ok, that was a really bad idea,’ said the giant. He snarled and swung for her. Punched a shuddering crack in the pavement as she leapt away. Another massive swing as she ducked aside. The homeless woman tried to run; the gathering crowd held her back screaming. Before Tabitha could get away, the giant was reaching for her. He swung again furiously and crumpled a street stall to scrap, as its owner yelled and dived away. Ducking and dodging his swings just made the giant angrier; his amphibian skin was changing colour. Flushing from dull white to stark black stripes. A mane of pale fins rose in furious red. When Tabitha ducked his next hit the giant struck a running Guardian clean across the street, with a stall-smashing bang.

‘Oh, shit,’ he rumbled, as he collared Tabitha and gripped her forearms in a powerful hand. She couldn’t move her hands to shock him. ‘I didn’t mean to, officer,’ the giant apologised. ‘I was trying to–

‘Down on the ground!’ the second officer yelled at him, pulling her pistol.

‘Hey, I work here!’ the giant snapped angrily. ‘I’m doing my job!’ ...And, I’m a runaway slave. I can’t get myself caught by these people.

‘You’re under arrest, for assaulting a Ministry officer!’ the Guardian replied, pointing her gun. ‘Down on the ground, now!’ The street was crowding with onlookers.

‘Hey fuck you, I’m working!’ Fish raged back. ‘Not my fault that stupid bastard got in the way!’ Struggling in his grip, Tabitha watched the first Guardian stagger up and come over, pulling his gun. Forcing the homeless woman to stand still before she could slip away.

‘So you’re arresting all three of us now?’ the homeless woman snapped. Raia, the mob, that Guardian I shot dead... if they pull me in for questioning, it’s all over.

‘Shut up,’ the first officer replied, bloody and nasal; broken-nosed. ‘Stand over there.’

I can’t get caught, Tabitha told herself. I cannot get fucking caught. Think! She jumped in shock at a sudden gunshot. The homeless woman had shot the first Guardian down. Head ringing, empty of thoughts, Tabitha watched the second officer turn her pistol on the junkie. She leapt between them, pushing the woman aside to take the crackling shot in the back. Tabitha screamed in pain and dropped the Guardian with a wild-eyed knockout. She stumbled gasping on the muddy road, as everyone stared in shock; coughing blood from a healing lung. Gasping for breath she spat it like quicksilver, in a neon-reflecting puddle.

‘You’re... healing,’ the giant rumbled, staring at the shrinking wound that should’ve dropped her.

‘You saved my life,’ the homeless woman muttered, watching Tabitha’s silver wound heal up. ‘...Why?’

‘Sky Queen! Get down on the ground or we will kill you!’ came a voice over a speaker above them. A Guardian aircar descended over the street; its spotlight flaring in the sky.

‘Sky Queen?’ the giant mumbled. ‘Like on the news?’ Tabitha just stared at them.

‘All of you, on the ground!’ the speaker screamed, as the aircar’s cannons whirred around to take aim. ‘All units, on me! Three fugitives identified!’

‘Fugitives?’ Tabitha muttered, staring at the other two.

‘Shit!’ snarled the homeless woman.

‘...Fuck this,’ the giant rumbled, charging off down the street.

‘Stop, or we will shoot!’ the loudspeaker warned them. Tabitha looked up as the aircar’s spotlight exploded into sparks, and its shots never came. The homeless woman shoved the smoking laser pistol back in her belt; she turned to watch the running giant disappear up the street ahead. Glancing back at Tabitha with newfound respect.

‘Come on.’

The streets beyond were a panicked chaos as Fish charged through the parting crowds. Guardians were screaming at everyone to get down as they took shots at the running giant. Two officers ran from their aircar ahead of him, reaching for their guns. He wasn’t stopping though; the pair yelled and jumped away as the monster smashed his way past.

‘Help me get off this planet!’ Tabitha told the homeless woman. They ran on past unconscious Guardians in the giant’s trail of destruction. People watched in terror from glowing shops and doorways; staring faces and snatched conversations as they hurtled past.

‘What do I get out of it?’ the homeless woman replied, sprinting on behind her.

‘Safety!’ Tabitha called back, ducking at lasershots behind them. ‘Somewhere they can’t find you!’

‘Deal!’ the woman replied, nothing left to lose, and punched a staggering officer in the face as she ran past. Another Guardian scrambled for the gun on her belt as Tabitha came sprinting at her and laid her out cold in the mud.

‘Fish! Wait up!’ the homeless woman called to the giant, down the next panicked street.

‘How do we get out of here!?’ he shouted back, waiting for them to catch up. Tabitha looked past his shoulder at a Guardian car descending.

‘Move!’ she yelled, pushing them aside.

‘This way!’ said the homeless woman, tearing off down a narrow side street as the aircar’s gunshots flashed and pounded up the road.

‘We need a ship!’ Tabitha yelled, following them down another night-lit street. Barging and shoving past shocked people in the road.

‘Straight on!’ Aelu called to her, firing her pistol in the air to scatter the screaming crowd. ‘Shit!’ Up ahead a Guardian car dropped to block the street. Tabitha was shoved aside by a colossal strength. The giant charged on and tackled the car aside with a thumping crash.

‘I’ll take that ship too!’ Fish rumbled back at them, leading the way.

‘Can you fly one?’ Tabitha called after him, her legs burning as she sprinted on behind.

‘I can!’ the homeless woman said breathlessly, running on at her side.

‘You?’ said Tabitha.

‘I haven’t always been homeless!’ she shot back angrily. ‘And we can do stuff, you know!’ The three of them were running for a spot-lit compound across an empty car park. Shouting Guardians fired on them from behind. ‘Fish!’ the homeless woman yelled. ‘Get the fence!’

‘K,’ he rumbled back, and broke into a fierce sprint for the compound ahead. Grunted and tackled the metal perimeter to crumpled ruins. They followed him in over the thick crashing fence, hurtling through a shipyard while Guardians yelled and shot in the spot-lit night. Racing on past towering walls of shipping containers, the homeless woman led them to the crappiest old starship they’d ever seen.

‘Does that even fly!? Fish said breathlessly.

‘Hope so,’ the woman muttered, clutching frantically at the door release. Beating on the rusty panels to force it. ‘The door’s dead, it won’t open!’ she said. ‘Help me get in, I think I can fly it!’

‘You think you can fly it!?’ said Tabitha, gasping for breath.

‘You’re fucking high!’ Fish said furiously.

‘If you’ve got any better ideas I’d love to hear them!’ the woman snapped, firing her pistol on a Guardian aircar sweeping overhead. Fish growled and gripped the ship’s airlock door, straining giant muscles to try to force it open. Guardians ran in past the distant shipping containers; their laser rifles cracked and pounded the starship with smoking thuds all around them.

‘Let me try!’ Tabitha said desperately, shoving in to grab the door switch. Pushing volts into it made the door fly open and the ship’s lights flicker to life.

‘Nice!’ said Fish, helping them inside.

‘Anyone home? ‘Cause you’re about to not be on this planet!’ the homeless woman called through the small ship, banging on the stained old walls as she rushed for the cockpit. The giant grunted and hauled himself in after Tabitha, and wrestled the heavy door shut. Laser shots thumped and thudded on the panels outside.

‘Go! Now!’ he roared from the back.

‘Hold onto something!’ the homeless woman called from the cockpit, as she strapped in. ‘Gods, I should’ve stolen this thing months ago,’ she muttered, flicking switches frantically. ‘Who’d let a classic rust away in this dump?’

‘Classic!?’ said Fish, as he tangled himself up in cargo netting and held on. ‘That’s what you call this thing?’

‘Come on, show me some love,’ the woman muttered to the cockpit in panic, as she hammered down sticky switches and yanked a rusty lever. An ancient engine burst into loud glowing life, shuddering the walls with a jetroar.

‘It’s working,’ Tabitha mumbled in shock. She swept a heap of clattering old cans from the co-pilot seat to strap in.

‘Of course it’s working,’ the woman snapped proudly.

‘Is this yours or something?’ said Tabitha.

‘If it was mine I would’ve left this shithole a long time ago,’ she replied, squinting through the grimy glass canopy. ‘I was just too scared to get caught stealing it. But, since we’re going to jail anyway...’ Lasershots thumped and flashed against them as the old ship rose hovering over the yard.

‘Oh shit,’ the woman laughed nervously. The night sky was filled with a hovering spot-lit barricade of Guardian cars. Bolts of white light came screaming and thumping into the ship.

‘Think they might want us to land,’ Fish rumbled in the back, as the panelling all around him thumped and sparked with laserfire.

‘Has this thing got weapons?’ said Tabitha, searching the bank of switches around her.

‘No,’ the woman laughed. ‘It’s a hauler. A garbage ship.’

‘...So it’s tough?’ Tabitha replied.

‘Oh, it’s tough,’ the woman said proudly, watching the spotlight-blinding cars surround them in the sky. A voice over loudspeaker ordered them to land or be shot down.

‘So go through them,’ said Tabitha, meeting her look.

‘Well alright then,’ the woman grinned back. She gripped the thrust lever and crunched it down. The rusty ship shot forward; its mossy engines belched a blue roaring glow. Ploughing through the Guardian aircars like a flying tank. The yelling cars that turned and tailed them were barged out of the sky in booming crashes, as the ugly ship swerved side-to-side and picked up speed. The homeless woman laughed like a maniac when they tore through another aircar in a flaring fireball, and thundered off in the rainy night sky.

‘So what magic place are we going where the Ministry can’t arrest us?’ the giant rumbled in the back. Burping and gagging at the stomach-twisting feeling of flight.

‘Stormworld,’ said Tabitha, looking back at him.

‘...Stormworld,’ he replied sarcastically. ‘Oh really.’

‘Yeah,’ Tabitha said defensively, confused by his tone.

‘And what makes you think we’ll be safe from the Ministry on... Stormworld?’ he said, smirking like she’d lost her mind.

‘I’m their queen,’ Tabitha replied. The homeless woman burst out laughing.

‘I knew you were a dealer,’ she chuckled, taking the starship higher through the moonlit clouds. ‘Whatever you’re on, I want it.’

‘So you’re... not kidding,’ said Fish, looking more and more concerned about her sanity.

‘No,’ Tabitha replied, affronted. ‘Why do you think the Guardians were chasing me? I’m the Sky Queen. I escaped.’

‘So... you were the one on the news?’ said the homeless woman, doubtfully.

‘No way,’ Fish rumbled back. ‘You’re not tall enough to be the Sky Queen.’

‘What?’ said Tabitha, confused. ‘How tall is she?’

‘...Taller,’ Fish replied knowingly. ‘With horns.’

‘They weren’t real horns,’ Tabitha sighed, watching the stars through the grimy glass. ‘...Do I need proof of identity or something?’ she muttered. ‘I don’t care if you believe me or not.’

‘Hm. You do sound moody enough to be her,’ Fish considered.

‘Look, just tell me where to go,’ the homeless woman chuckled beside them.

‘...Well, Stormworld’s not on the maps yet,’ Tabitha admitted. ‘I don’t know where to find it.’

‘This does,’ said the woman, tossing her a wristcom from her damp coat pocket.

‘How did you get this?’ Tabitha replied, slipping it on to tap the small screen.

‘Prospector’s hands,’ she said, wiggling her fingers. ‘They find stuff on people. Especially dumb bastards trying to arrest me in the street.’

‘It’s not showing any maps,’ Tabitha mumbled, poking uselessly at the screen. It was more advanced than the ones she was used to. It worked differently. The homeless woman sighed impatiently.

‘Wristcom, show maps,’ she barked at it, as the starship rumbled on into space. Tabitha watched the screen come to life suddenly. It popped up a galactic chart.

‘Oh,’ Tabitha mumbled, as the woman shook her head in disdain. ‘Stormworld,’ she commanded it. The angular black wristcom beeped and showed a distant dot.

‘Guardian wristcoms have this stuff on file. Civilian wristcoms don’t, obviously,’ the woman explained. ‘I’m Aelu, by the way,’ she added. ‘Jai’s not my real name,’ she told the giant, before he could ask.

‘I’m Tabitha,’ she replied.

‘Big Fish,’ said Big Fish.

‘That’s really your name?’ said Tabitha, turning in her seat.

‘Underwater race. Lung transplant,’ he explained briefly, in his deep rumbling voice. ‘My real name’s in sonar. Burst your eardrums if I told you.’

‘Oh. Well... thank you for not doing that, then,’ Tabitha replied awkwardly.

‘No problem,’ said Big Fish.

‘So, Stormworld. What’s the star system?’ said Aelu, smacking the ship’s flickering old computer back to life.

‘Er,’ Tabitha replied, studying the intricate star map on the wristcom. ‘Just says PJP8256.’

‘PJP, 82, 56,’ Aelu mumbled, stabbing it into the crusty old keypad by the computer. Something beeped. ‘Hm. Actually worked,’ she said in surprise. The rusty old ship veered suddenly, creeping around a quarter-turn. Before Tabitha could ask the woman if she actually knew what she was doing, the rattling starship shot into lightspeed and threw her back against the seat. Staring wide-eyed through the dirty canopy, as the rushing stars melted to a bleeding white glow.

54

‘Hey,’ said Aelu, as they dropped out of lightspeed. ‘What you did back there, in the street. Taking that shot for me. That should’ve killed you.’

‘People try,’ Tabitha mumbled bitterly. Clawing dried crumbling mud from the ribbed scales on her catsuit. ‘I heal fast. It’s a mutation,’ she tried to explain. ‘It’s a long story.’

‘Well, what I mean to say is... thank you,’ Aelu replied, with a rare smile that lit up her tired face. ‘No one does stuff like that. Take a shot for someone. Not that I’ve ever seen.’

‘It was honourable,’ Big Fish agreed. ‘Your ancestors would be proud.’

‘I hope so,’ Tabitha said quietly, dwelling on the past. The castle. Her friends. ‘...It’s what a Ghost should do,’ she muttered to herself.

‘What?’ Aelu replied, studying the strange alien beside her. Tabitha was lost in thought. She was still worrying about Saa, and what she might have done to find her before she escaped Serenity. Aelu had shown her how to send Saa an encrypted message, on their stolen wristcom. She just hoped it’d reach her in time.

‘That your planet?’ said Big Fish, stooping through the cockpit doorway to nod at the glass canopy. Out ahead, Stormworld’s distant sphere grew bigger in the starry black. A rising world of bronze-green and cloud-wrapped blue.

‘The north continent there, on the end of the hook shape,’ Tabitha directed Aelu, as the world filled their view. Trying and failing to stifle her smile. I’m home.

‘Look,’ Big Fish rumbled, pointing off to one corner of the canopy, at two thin shapes among the stars. ‘Trouble.’

‘You’re in restricted space,’ said a sudden crackling voice over the cockpit speakers. ‘Turn back, or we will fire on you.’ The twin battleships lurked in orbit.

‘All these Guardians talk the same,’ Big Fish muttered.

‘Keep going,’ Tabitha told Aelu, who glanced at her nervously in the pilot seat.

‘Sky Queen,’ the voice addressed them again, over the comm. ‘Surrender and live, or you will be destroyed.’ Aelu looked at her, terrified.

‘So you really are the Sky Queen,’ said Big Fish. ‘...Huh.’

‘Don’t shoot,’ Tabitha replied over the comm. ‘We surrender. We’re coming aboard.’

‘What the hell are you doing?’ Aelu whispered angrily.

‘Lying,’ Tabitha replied, tapping her nose.

‘Ingenious,’ said Big Fish.

‘Please don’t tell me you want to outrun them,’ Aelu groaned.

‘Only as far as the atmosphere,’ said Tabitha. ‘Can you jump us there?’

‘At lightspeed!?’ Aelu snapped.

‘Well, it’s either that or get blown up,’ said Big Fish, nodding at the fighters swarming from the battleships. ‘I don’t think they’re gonna arrest us.’

‘Shit,’ Aelu sighed, flicking dials and switches in a rush. ‘...Shit!’

‘Yep,’ Big Fish replied.

‘We could die, you do know that!?’ said Aelu, tapping away frantically at the console.

‘Do it,’ said Tabitha, watching the fighters tearing towards them.

‘Ah, I hate you already,’ Aelu sighed in panic, grabbing the controls.

‘Do it!’ Tabitha yelled. Aelu slammed a lever down and launched them at the planet through sudden white space. She yanked it back immediately, dropping them from lightspeed in a pounding thunderstorm over the mountains. They’d shot past the battleships into the atmosphere, dodging lightning and wrestling turbulence. Screaming and pulling up as the ship scraped a mountain peak.

‘Whoa,’ said Big Fish, staring in shock, as they cleared the mountains and levelled out.

‘...Never make me do that again!’ Aelu yelled furiously.

‘Hey, we’re still alive aren’t we?’ Tabitha countered.

‘That close!’ Aelu snapped wildly, trembling in her seat. Pinching a tiny gap in the air. ‘That fucking close!’ Big Fish and Tabitha shared a look in the sudden tense silence. ‘Gods, I need a drink,’ Aelu sighed angrily. ‘Just... tell me where to land this piece of shit.’

‘I thought this piece of shit was a classic,’ Big Fish mumbled.

‘Don’t start!’ Aelu screamed back.

Come on, thought Tabitha, as they flew on towards familiar land in the distance. Come and get us. She tried to launch her thoughts to the world somehow, to him, as the starship bumped and shook through the stormclouds. Hoping that he saw them coming. Rushing raindrops bled across the glass canopy.

‘Wow,’ Aelu mumbled, as they finally cleared the storm. The clouded sun glowed golden through a primal world. Coiling mist on stark tundra. Ancient forests sloped to jagged-jaw mountains, vast and fierce as old tales. Snowy summits rolled on endlessly, until they faded away against the frozen sky.

‘...Not bad,’ Big Fish conceded. ‘Nothing close to my world... but not bad.’ Tabitha watched the view, and said nothing. Her smiling face glowed in the streaming sunlight.

Serenity could never compare to this, she told herself. I’m home. A sudden shot blew the engine; the blast rocked them violently.

‘Gunships,’ said Aelu, terrified. Watching the rear-view monitor as the pack tailed them. The wasp-looking fighters whipped after them through high white clouds. They closed in fast, rattling bright shots through the limping starship as it smoked and fell. The three fugitives held on tight in the cockpit as their burning engine exploded. Suddenly they were dropping. A diving smoketrail in the blue.

‘Level it!’ Tabitha screamed.

‘I’m trying!’ Aelu yelled back, fumbling frantically to fire the landing jets. Booming shots blew away the back of the ship in flames. Clutching her seat in panic, Tabitha met Aelu’s terrified stare. The gunships dived in for the kill.

‘What’s that!?’ said Big Fish. A prehistoric shape shot from the mountains towards them; a vapourtrail scarring the sky. Twin stars in a jetroar smokecloud. Death-black supersonic. Tabitha’s heart leapt at the sight of him. Seven’s roar shook the cockpit as he tore past like a rocket. He ploughed through the gunships to rip them from the sky, snarling a pale inferno. Bright eyes blazing, he wheeled and chased them as they scattered in shock. Hurtling after one as it dived for low ground, he torched it mid-air with an echoing bang. Engines whining, the smoking gunship dropped in a spin. Seven shot past his kill as it punched the crags like a meteor.

‘Gods,’ Aelu muttered, watching the carnage through the canopy as she tried desperately to slow their fall. Seven thundered past them for the gunships firing back. He mauled them mangled and dropped them in flames, and smashed them to burning black fireworks in the blue. He shot past dark and deafening to chase down the last like an animal. Cutting the air and tailing its turns like some skyborne shark; hunting it with primeval perfection. He snatched and wrestled it to fireball scrap, and sent it thumping down in the mountains. Shouting his dominance with a bellowing roar. Aelu yelled in fright when Seven swept back overhead, and grabbed their falling ship with an earthquake tremor. Tabitha was grinning. Big Fish watched the creaking ceiling in dread.

‘It’s ok,’ she told them happily, hearing his jetscales thunder as he slowed their fall. ‘He’s mine.’

Seven set their ruined ship down in thick forest, beyond Sacred Mountain and the lake. Overlooking the scarred plain where the invaders’ war-torn camp had disappeared. He landed beside them with a giant thump and a pining growl, as Tabitha ran to hug his snout.

‘What the hell did we get into?’ Big Fish mumbled to Aelu, watching them from the weird gold trees. The red-haired monkey thing chattered endlessly to the massive monster; patting its dark scales in loving reunion.

‘Hm,’ Aelu shrugged, shaking her head. Lost for words. Edging away in horror at big primal bugs in the leaf litter, and strange disgusting pipe-mould on the trees. At least she was out of that damn city, she supposed, and off that depressing world. The air was freezing here, but a hell of a lot fresher. There weren’t any buildings or chimneys; no smog or sewers, or miserable factory crowds. Just a silent empty wilderness, beautiful and bleak, that looked like it could kill her a whole lot faster. She studied blast marks in the mountains and plains around them; deep dark gouges across the world. Forests and foothills were missing huge jagged chunks, as if they’d been torn away by teeth.

‘What happened here?’ she muttered.

‘...The Ministry,’ Big Fish replied.

‘Where is everyone?’ Tabitha asked Seven, looking around at the silent world. She knew the Ministry’s invasion was stepping up; she’d seen the news in her cell. But there was no sign of it here. The mining engines had done their damage and gone. The cold wind tousled her hair, rumbling in her ears like a tide.

‘Did Deep Roots and the others get back?’ she said. ‘Where did the invaders go? ...What’s going on?’ Seven’s mind felt strangely quiet. She noticed a scatter of pale cratered scars across his black scales; saw more and more beneath his wings and body. Some were vicious scorched blasts, still healing up.

‘Are you ok!?’ she said, filled with worry. Putting a hand on his snout, his thoughts told her everything. The fresh mining, and the fierce fighting; the artillery ambush that smashed the tribe and drove him away bleeding as he protected them. How Deep Roots, Barkless and Sea Mist had come back in chains; kept hostage to bait the tribe from hiding into captivity, one by one. Seven explained that he’d failed them, stuck weak and bleeding in the mountains, while they’d been broken and caught. Imprisoned in some big new base. He’d destroyed everything he could to get them back. But the bright new cutting cannons kept driving him away, gouged and bleeding in agony.

‘Seven, it’s ok,’ Tabitha replied, in deep concern. ‘I’m just glad you’re alright. Tell me where everyone is now. Where did they build this new base?’

‘Hey,’ Big Fish called over. He pointed Tabitha to a small column of smoke nearby.

‘That’s mourningfire,’ Tabitha mumbled. Thick blue-grey smoke rose from the forest; the kind that burned for burials. A dark figure watched them from the trees.

‘Barkless!?’ Tabitha said in shock. Running over to him in relief. ‘Are you ok!? You’re alone?’ Her retainer said nothing; just hugged her powerfully and held her stare. Shaking his head. Hopeless.

Barkless led them on through the forest; trying to explain to Tabitha that he was only walking free to lure more people back to the pens. They’d start to execute the tribe if he didn’t, they’d said. He led them to the top of a wooded hill, to show her the view far below. Tabitha stared in dread. Sacred Mountain, towering in the distance... its lower side was a blast mine. A long sheer cliff had been torn in its foothills, facing the lake. Huge mining engines crawled there, eating the fresh rock. The tribe’s home, their great holy site since time began, reduced to a quarry.

‘I’ll kill them!’ Tabitha screamed desperately, burning up with hate. ‘I’ll fucking kill them!’

‘Whoa,’ Big Fish mumbled to Aelu, watching the red-haired creature raging in the distance. Before Tabitha could climb furiously into Seven’s saddle, Barkless stopped her.

Sky Tribe, already fought them, he signed to her. Defeated. Captured. In there. He nodded hopelessly to a squat white settlement; a pre-fab complex beyond the lake. A hulking fortress of armoured walls and cannon turrets, slammed down on bulldozed forest. The lakeshore, and the gold bamboo that had lined it... now it was all a concrete landing strip. Deer and mothbirds, nowhere to be seen. The invaders had rounded up the tribe in pens, like animals. Imprisoned like a dangerous cult. Now they got to watch their Sacred Mountain being slowly mined to rubble, day after day. If there was only one way to break the tribe, this was it. To defile the holy centre of their world, and eat it away. Maybe just until they were ready to take new Ministry jobs, and buy Ministry homes – all tax and proceeds to Serenity, of course. There’d be bright new education for the cubs; encouraged to forget First Ancestor and the painted words, and lose all trace of Fierce-Hope. Barkless had already given up; she saw the broken look in his eyes.

Fighting them, is too dangerous, he signed. They’ll kill the tribe if we attack. There’s no Fierce-Hope left here. We’ve lost.

‘...They’ve torn down Havenhall,’ Tabitha mumbled, her voice quiet and faltering. Staring at the burned ruins high on the mountainside. It hadn’t just been some bunch of giant branches; it was home. Their last refuge. It was where the bold laughing cubs had played hide and seek together; brown and bronze and red-eyed black. Whispering tiny fragile secrets in the winter shadows. Enraptured in stories by the Hearthfire’s glow, and wrapped in warm sleeping-furs against the freezing nights. It was where Deep Roots had taught the painted words on the rockface; and why they had to live in Fierce-Hope for one another in these strange terrible times. It was where men and women from Cave Clan, Red-Eye and Bronzeback had snuck away to ghost-glow chambers, safe from the world, and made frightened forbidden love as their old lives fell to pieces around them. Tabitha stared, heartbroken, at Sacred Mountain’s great gouges and scars. Everything they’d worked and fought for, gone. She felt a hefty giant hand on her shoulder, as Big Fish stood beside her.

‘Where’s Deep Roots, and Sea Mist?’ she said. ‘Are they in that prison? Where’s Fishbowl?’ Barkless was shaking his head in tears as he walked away. Tabitha watched Aelu go after him, and share his silent look. Two people who’d never met, who didn’t speak the same language, but they both knew grief. Aelu sat Barkless down as he sobbed. She put her arm around his broad shoulders in the windblown silence, and held him. Tabitha felt her tears coming as she watched him break down.

‘Don’t cry,’ said Big Fish. He turned her away with a giant hand.

‘How can you say that!?’ Tabitha replied angrily. ‘I–

‘You can’t cry in front of him,’ the giant interrupted. ‘You’re his queen.’

‘What’s that got to do with anything?’ Tabitha snapped. ‘Can’t I grieve for my tribe?’

‘Look at him,’ said Big Fish. ‘On my world, we’d say that Shoalbond has left him. The pride and strength he takes from the thoughts of his people. Right now, and always, you are his strength. Be his Shoalbond for him, when he has none.’ Tabitha watched Barkless, her broken one-man tribe, and thought back to what Deep Roots had shown her on the mountain that day. About what it meant to rule. A single stick snapped easily. Many sticks together, did not. She was the binding, around those many sticks. She was their queen.

‘Barkless. Get up,’ she commanded him, hard-voiced as she walked over. ‘There’s always hope,’ she told him, meeting his tearful look. Barkless Tree studied the ground sadly. He looked up when she held out her hand, holding her stare. Searching that look in her eyes; that fragile ferocity.

‘...Come with me,’ Tabitha urged him quietly. ‘Fight back.’ Barkless stared at her, and took her hand, and saw his queen again. His sister, Dark Storm, named at the Hearthfire just like him. She took his shoulder firmly. He felt her Fierce-Hope in the strength of her grip, and stamped down his grief. He grabbed her hand strongly and got to his feet, wiping his eyes shamefully.

‘Kha V’ha,’ he said quietly.

I need you, Tabitha signed to him; a nod and a stare, her palm on her heart.

You have me, Barkless signed back, with a thump on his chest. Gripping her shoulder tight. Lead.

‘...We need to fight back, now,’ said Tabitha, turning to the others. ‘We have to force the Ministry off this world, or they’ll never stop. Will you help us?’

‘So we’re a rebel army now?’ Aelu snapped sarcastically. ‘The four of us, against the entire Ministry?’ she said angrily. ‘I didn’t come here to get dragged into a war. I thought you said we’d be safe here! You said this was a safe place to hide!’

‘But hiding won’t change anything,’ Tabitha replied.

‘No, but it’ll keep us alive!’ Aelu yelled. ‘Trust me, that’s as good as it gets!’

‘Grow some conviction!’ Tabitha shot back. ‘You told me your whole sad story on the way here, but you didn’t tell me what you’d do about it! The Ministry ruined your life, so you were just going to sleep on the streets and get out of your mind to forget it!?’ Aelu glared at her furiously. Hurt. The truth broke her heart.

‘And you, you wanted to settle down and blend in? After everything you’ve been through!?’ she asked Big Fish. ‘Don’t you want revenge for your family? For yourself!? Don’t you want to tear those tyrants apart!?’ The giant said nothing; he just looked at the ground in shame.

‘The Ministry’s taken everything from us!’ said Tabitha. ‘If we don’t fight back to live free lives, while we still have the chance... then what’s the fucking point!?’

‘They’ve got an entire army here!’ Aelu said furiously.

‘So do we!’ Tabitha replied. ‘Right down there in those cells!’

‘It’s not enough,’ Big Fish said hopelessly, shaking his head. ‘Even if we win here, we’ll never beat the Guardians. They’ve got an army of millions, do you understand? They’ll destroy us. They’ll just keep coming back.’

‘...But we’re not alone,’ Tabitha urged them, more gently. ‘How many people out there are suffering because of the Ministry, just like us?’ she asked them. ‘All those lives they’ve ruined, and bled dry... how many people would rise up against them, to take their freedom back?’ Big Fish paused; lost in thought.

‘The Ministry’s made a lot of people rich,’ Aelu replied, hopelessly.

‘And keeps a lot more people poor,’ Big Fish considered, thinking of his own world. There were a dozen planets like his, all sleepwalking into slavery, like there was nothing they could do. His people never had much before the Ministry, and their new jobs in the hydroplants. But they had their health, and freedom, and a beautiful world. It was more than they had now. Food shortages never used to happen. The elders had always talked about the old times like they were a fairy tale; a time when people could do what they liked.

‘...You really think we could start an uprising?’ Big Fish wondered.

‘I know we could,’ said Tabitha, meeting his stare. ‘Empires always fall.’

‘So all these worlds, and all these different cultures,’ said Aelu. ‘You’ve seen what they’re up against. They don’t even get along between themselves. You really think they’d all come together and follow us, in some insane war for independence?’

‘No. But they’ll follow an idea,’ Tabitha replied, as the thoughts clicked in her head. She thought back to Will, in his castle. ‘...You can’t kill an idea. Once it’s yours, you’re unstoppable.’

‘Yeah? And what is this miraculous idea?’ said Aelu.

‘Look, everyone’s different. They don’t get along. I get it,’ Tabitha replied. ‘But they’re all slaves to the Ministry,’ she said. ‘Imagine armies of freedom fighters. Billions of them. All the remnants of free people, on free worlds, with the same enemy. Even the Guardians couldn’t hold that back. All it takes is the right push, and they’ll rise up and fight. Once they really see what’s happened to them, they’ll come back to haunt the Ministry until they tear it apart.’ She met their silent stares. 'Like Ghosts.’ Big Fish crossed his huge arms, deep in thought. Aelu watched the world in silence.

‘...Well,’ she sighed wearily, meeting Tabitha’s look. ‘I’m tired of hiding. I admit it,’ she said. ‘And I’ve got nothing to go back to. Nothing but the next fix, anyway,’ she chuckled, with a sad smile. ‘The things I’ve done... I’ll rot in jail for the rest of my life.’

‘...I won’t be the ancestor my people are ashamed to remember,’ said Big Fish. ‘The one who did nothing, and ran from the fight, when thieves and killers poisoned his world,’ he snarled. ‘Nothing could shame me more.’ He studied the vast blue sky, and thought of home. It’d been beautiful, once. Before the jobs, and the illness, and the factories that scorched the food and vivid life from their waters. Before all that, his people had worked every waking hour. But at least they’d worked for themselves. ‘...Maybe I survived my execution for a reason,’ he said. ‘Maybe the Shoalbond meant for me to meet you here. Both of you,’ he said. ‘If that’s true, then I was meant to join you. What you call Ghosts, I call Shoalbond. It’s the same. Maybe I was meant to fight with you.’

‘My ancestors may have meant for me to come here too,’ Aelu considered. ‘Maybe this really is how I’m fated to take my vengeance. But honestly... it’s just a second chance. And yeah, I suppose I’d prefer to die fighting than overdose in the gutter. Or rot in a prison cell,’ she sighed.

‘Trust me. You’ve got plenty of fight in you,’ Tabitha assured her. ‘You were the one who got us here, after all.’

‘Well, there’s nothing else left for me,’ Aelu sighed. ‘...Alright. Let’s do it.’

‘Welcome to the Ghosts,’ Tabitha replied, with a tired smile. A rising feeling inside. She signed to Barkless, about what they’d said. That these outsiders were grieving in Fierce-Hope too. That they’d fight for the tribe. She tried to explain the Ghosts to him; these fighting Lost Spirits from every hill and shore. She tried to ask if he’d join her.

‘I, have,’ he replied, confused by the question. ‘I, am, yours.’ He signed to explain himself; that he was her queensguard. Her retainer. That his spirit had been hers since the day he crowned her. ‘My life, yours,’ he said. ‘Always.’ Tabitha couldn’t find the words to say. She just squeezed his shoulder, sharing his smile.

‘So what now?’ said Big Fish. ‘We’re really gonna take them on?’ Tabitha turned to watch the invaders’ base in the distance. A gleaming white fortress, orderly and beautiful, bristling with fierce artillery. A slice of Serenity, taking this world by force.

‘Those bastards aren’t getting the message,’ she said. ‘I’m going to make them understand. They can’t just take what they want from this world. They can’t lock my family away like slaves. No one fucks with my tribe.’ Big Fish nodded. Tabitha felt her jaw tightening, as the rage boiled up inside. ‘...It starts here. The war against the Ministry,’ she said. ‘We’re going to beat them harder than anything they’ve seen before.’ Her fists crackled with bright volts at the anger inside her. A dim light glowed in her eyes. ‘I’m going to burn today so deep in their minds that they’ll never come back here again.’

55

‘...Do you hear that?’ said a red-skinned Guardian, on the panelled fortress wall. Fresh from the new starships in orbit. Watching the towering mountains all around them, and the heavy grey sky beyond. Listening intently for the sound. ‘...What the hell is that?’

‘For the tenth time, I don’t have your hearing,’ said a four-armed man beside her. ‘You already won the bet. Stop rubbing it in.’ She wasn’t listening to him. Just staring at the grim sky, searching for the sound. There was something, growing clearer, right on the edge of his hearing. A distant rumble, like a coming storm.

‘Uh, Surveillance, we’re hearing something out here,’ he said into his wristcom. Following the rookie’s gaze across the dark clouds. Glancing along the perimeter wall, he saw dozens more troops growing more animated about the sound. Puffing clouds of vapour as they talked and coughed in the cold air; watching the dull world and the winter sky. More radio chatter. It couldn’t be that thing again. He’d already watched that huge bastard bleeding to death from the artillery, when it’d finally flown away. But something had brought those gunships down today. No survivors. Maybe a mercenary starship, apparently.

‘This is Surveillance. Confirmed,’ the voice replied over his wristcom, with a hint of dread. ‘Incoming.’ Sudden yells echoed across the base. Both of them jumped in shock when Captain Atha’s shouts rang out through the speakers, and ten-ton artillery roared deafening light at the sky. All the pair could learn from the shouting troops around them were it’s her. It’s her.

‘Who?’ said the red-skinned woman.

‘Should’ve used that hearing of yours in the Captain’s briefing, Private,’ the man replied.

‘...Her!?’ she said, staring at him in horror. She’d heard the scare stories on her way here, about the one the savages used to follow. The Sky Queen. The feral bitch who wouldn’t die. ‘I thought she was gone?’ she said nervously. ‘Shit,’ she mumbled.

‘Aim your weapon, Private,’ he told her calmly, watching her lost frightened stare. ‘Private!’ he snapped.

‘...Yes, sir!’ she replied, as the screeching artillery flashed and boomed in the clouds around the misted mountain. No sign of its shadow yet. He watched the rookie breathe out shakily, as they all took their cover along the silent wall. Checking her rounds, for the third time. Steadying her rattling rifle at the sky.

‘If she gets in close then aim for her, not the animal. Don’t stop firing,’ he told her calmly. She nodded nervously. A dark distant shape circled the mountain peak, hidden in the gloomy clouds. ‘Let the artillery handle the monster,’ he said. ‘If it does get in close, and you see it take a breath, it’s gonna blow fire right through these walls. Don’t look back, and don’t take cover. Just run. For your fucking life.’

‘...Ok?’ she said, terrified.

Sea Mist heard a roar in the stormclouds, great and terrible. She looked at the others in the holding pens around her, and met Stone Shore’s beaten stare. They watched the grey sky as a shrouded shape swept by in the distance, wreathed in cloud and smoke. But not just their bird-spirit... someone was riding it. Sea Mist felt her heart rising at the sight of her; all her joy and fury burned again like Hearthfire’s flames. She reached for her waist, where her knife should’ve been, and smiled tearfully at her sister’s return. Stone Shore came to stand beside her, and couldn’t believe his eyes. He breathed deep, and howled fiercely at the sight. The soldiers were staring in the compound around them, as the snarling tribals joined their voices in a haunting howl. Yelling at them to be quiet. Spooked.

High above, striped in dark warpaint, Tabitha swept Seven around the glooming summit. Giant laserfire thumped and boomed all around them, lighting the clouded sky in violent flashes. She saw the corpse of Havenhall, torn and levelled on Sacred Mountain below. Eyes fixed on those mining machines destroying their home. She felt Seven’s huge strength beneath her. A fierce burning hate in her heart. Gripping the saddle scale, pulling Barkless Tree’s knife from her belt, Tabitha yelled out to Sky Tribe’s rising howl. She sent Seven’s roar echoing through the darkening world, and dropped him like a bomb.

Sky Tribe saw the explosion from their pens. A great white fireball boomed on Sacred Mountain, as their long-gone bird spirit dived and burst the rock-eaters to thundering scrap. A sudden cheer pulled everyone to their feet, and set fires blazing in their hearts. Deep Roots looked around at the fresh Fierce-Hope in their eyes, and grinned, and howled to the sky with the rest.

‘Shut up!’ a nervous Guardian bellowed at them, aiming his rifle at their prison pens. ‘Shut the fuck up!’ All the soldiers got in return were fierce snarls and rattling walls. Stone Shore reached a rough clawed hand through the bars towards him. Shouting wild hoarse words the nervous soldier didn’t understand. Snarling through fangs with a rabid stare. Closing his trembling hand furiously, like he was crushing the man’s beating heart in his grip. The savages were growing wild; hundreds of them. Shaking and battering their pens across the compound.

Tabitha screamed and rounded Seven past the summit, still forced away by the invaders’ colossal guns. With a snarling thought she sent him diving for another mining machine and tore it off the mountain to fall. Biting and mauling it, burning it through, Seven sent it crashing half-molten down the slopes. It hit the crags and exploded. The fortress artillery blew bright and lethal down below, sending endless laserbolts screeching and thumping all around them. Seven snarled as a glancing shot punched a hissing trench through his tail. Those guns would kill him.

‘Go! Get away!’ Tabitha yelled, diving him aside, as the fierce cutting shots closed in around them.

‘Can’t believe that bitch is back here,’ Captain Atha growled furiously, as he stormed across the base to climb the high walls. Watching the monster’s dark distant shape weaving away from the thumping artillery beyond the mountain. ‘I want her dropped the moment she’s back in range!’ he yelled at the gunners around him. ‘Do not take your eyes off that bitch! Is that clear!?’

‘Yes Captain,’ they replied in unison.

‘If we can’t kill her, then we start killing savages where she can see!’ he commanded. ‘Bait her back here!’

‘Yes Captain,’ his troops replied.

‘And where are those bloody missiles!?’ he demanded of another officer. ‘I want them armed and ready! We could’ve grounded her by now!’

‘Yes sir!’ the gunner replied, running off for the new launchers still being programmed and loaded on the walls.

‘Captain, it sounds like a scout’s rounded up another savage from the forest,’ said an approaching officer. ‘I think Perimeter wants confirmation to–

‘Yeah, yeah,’ Atha interrupted angrily, looking up from yet another hurried report on his wristcom. ‘Perimeter already asked about it,’ he said shortly. ‘Just get it done. It’s not a priority right now.’

‘Yes, Captain,’ the officer replied, hurrying away as Atha barked more furious commands across the base. ‘That’s affirmative, Perimeter. Let ‘em in,’ the officer said into her wristcom.

‘Thanks for that,’ another Guardian replied into his own, behind a desk in the pre-fab entry office. He studied the pair on the camera feed outside; a scout and her captive. The face recognition software wasn’t working, as usual. The slightest bit of dirt threw it off, and she was covered in it. He hit the switch to open the armoured fortress doors. Sighing at the skeleton staff he’d been left with to run the perimeter gate, just himself and a guard, since everyone had suddenly been diverted to compound defence. He nodded at the armed heavy officer to escort the pair through the entrance.

‘Gods, you’re a fucking mess!’ he heard the armed officer laugh, as he led them on through the bright white corridor inside. ‘...Where’s your armour?’

‘I’m Scout, you idiot,’ the returning officer chuckled, as she followed him in through the entrance with her captive. Both of them caked head to toe in thick black mud. ‘I dress light, yeah?’ she said. ‘It’s kind of hard to cross country quietly in all that shit you’re wearing.’

‘Who’s wearing shit? You’re fucking covered in it,’ the armed officer laughed, looking to the man at the desk. ‘Whatever. You wanna get knifed by a savage, that’s your problem,’ he said dismissively. ‘I haven’t seen you before,’ he added, studying her under all that mud. ‘You one of the reinforcements?’

‘Yep. Fresh meat,’ she replied; a bright grin in all the muck. Tightening her grip on the pistol at the savage’s back.

‘Well, you picked your time to sign up,’ he chuckled. ‘Welcome to the frontier. Sign him in before you take him to the pens,’ he said, with a nod to the tribal in cuffs. ‘You can take over for me, too. I want a look at that bastard on the mountain.’

‘Yeah, yeah,’ the female officer replied, with a bored tone. He left her to it at the front desk and headed outside for the gun-thundering compound.

‘I fucking love that sound!’ he called back happily over the artillery racket, as the heavy doors opened and he walked off outside.

‘He’s right. You are a damn mess,’ the perimeter officer chuckled, as the woman walked the savage over to sign him in. Eyeing him cautiously. ‘Can’t believe you got this bastard by yourself. That’s squad work.’

‘Yeah, bagged him in the marshes,’ she said proudly. ‘Looked like he was trying to escape back to his queen. Came running out from the bushes, the second he saw her fly over, and got stuck in the mud,’ she laughed. ‘He put up a fight though, I’ll give him that,’ she chuckled, glancing at the mud all over her.

‘With a stun round in him too?’ said the man.

‘With a stun round,’ she replied. ‘Lost my rifle too, in all that shit. Searched for an hour.’

‘Oh, man,’ he chuckled. ‘I don’t wanna be you right now. Atha’s gonna tear your head off.’

‘Still. I got this bastard though, right?’ she said victoriously. The cuffed tribal was staring, furious.

‘Must be those fast reactions with your sort, eh?’ said the man, finishing up his paperwork for them. ‘Wish my kind had something useful like that. But, we don’t need all that much sleep, not like other kinds. So y’know. It’s something, anyway.’

‘Mm-hm,’ Aelu replied absently, tapping out a short custody report on the screen he’d given her. She nudged Barkless in the back. He pulled apart his bark-strip bindings, loose but convincing. The man stared in horror when the savage showed his hands. Barkless swung a punch that dropped him in a heap.

‘Still. We can all use a bit more rest,’ Aelu said pleasantly. She shot the man unconscious with the stun laser she’d slipped from his belt. Glancing around the empty office, she tried the holo terminal quickly as Barkless dragged the man’s body out of sight. ‘Can’t believe that actually worked,’ she muttered, shaking her head as she accessed the network. Maybe being married to a Guardian all those years had its advantages, after all. Anyway, it was the same golden rule for every mark: keep ‘em talking. Aelu’s fingers flew across the keyboard with a rapid clatter.

‘...Hm. Looks like I can access the containment pen override commands remotely, from here,’ she told Barkless, as she rushed through the Guardian software intently. He just looked at her and shrugged. He didn’t know what that meant. ‘I’ll... just do it,’ Aelu muttered awkwardly, looking back to the screen.

Outside in the compound, the laser artillery still flashed and thundered at the wheeling silhouette circling the mountains. Flying in closer, only to dive away again.

‘Don’t you dare stop firing!’ Captain Atha bellowed across the fortress loudspeakers. Hundreds of troops manned the walls. ‘She’s taunting us,’ he growled, watching the flying monster obsessively. He ignored the panicked chatter from his wristcom. The roars and howls from the pens were driving him mad. ‘And get those fucking missiles online!’ he bellowed. ‘I want her downed before those bloody beasts start rioting!’

‘Captain!’ said a terrified officer, running over.

‘Are the missiles online yet?’ Atha growled back, over the rising noise in the compound behind them. ‘Get a clear lock on that bastard, and use everything! Fucking bring her down!’

‘It’s the tribe, sir!’ said the frightened officer. ‘They’ve broken out!’ Stunned, speechless, Atha dragged his eyes from the officer to the compound behind them. The pen doors were open, leaving only the cubs and elders inside. Roaring rivers of tribals were pouring out through the yelling fortress, charging their captors in the compound to beat them viciously. Screaming carnage as they joined up in a writhing, rioting sea. They were taking cover behind pens and shipping containers, as they crept out across the base to hunt. The panicking Guardians were suddenly outnumbered.

‘Open fire!’ Atha bellowed across the base.

Aelu pushed her luck at the office terminal, frantically searching the software for a certain list of commands. No... no... Wait – there it was. She clicked down the list. A message box appeared. Perimeter override? Yes. Commanding officer confirmation? Yes. Immediate power down? Yes.

‘And...’ she said quietly, tapping the button on the keyboard.

All across the base, the thundering artillery stopped. Furious, Captain Atha looked away from the firefight on the savages, taking cover in the cluttered compound below. The firing troops could barely contain the tide of creeping tribals; some had already killed his men and women and taken their rifles to fire back.

‘What the fuck’s going on?’ he demanded of the gunners on the wall beside him. ‘Where’s my fucking artillery!?’

‘Looks like a power-down command, Captain,’ one gunner replied, studying the terminal beside a giant turret. Confused by it himself. ‘It’s from the management system.’

‘What!?’ Atha roared. ‘Where!?’

Aelu hummed to herself in the entry office, as she tore the computer terminal from the mains power and smashed it apart on the floor. She didn’t know if that’d achieve anything, but it did feel good. Hurrying back to the unconscious officer, she took off his belt and holstered his laser pistol, before he could come around.

‘Sounds like the breakout’s started,’ she told Barkless, at the rioting sound beyond the compound doors. ‘Are you ready?’ she said, arming her stolen pistol. Handing him her old one, with a few shots left. Nodding him to the heavy doors before they joined the fight outside. Something massive came crashing loudly through the open entry gates behind them.

‘You took your time,’ said Aelu.

‘There were really big guns shooting at me,’ Big Fish said breathlessly. ‘I couldn’t get across the landing ground. They’ve stopped now.’

‘I know,’ said Aelu.

‘...You’ve got mud all over you,’ said Big Fish.

‘I know,’ Aelu replied.

‘Not, open,’ Barkless growled, slamming his hands on the doors to the war-torn compound.

‘Looks like they’re print activated,’ said Aelu, studying the scanner beside them. ‘Maybe the guy’s fingerprint behind the desk there, if we can drag him over h– ...where did he go?’ The officer must’ve woken up and crawled away. ‘Where is he!? We need to find him!’ she said. Barkless Tree dragged her away from the locked doors at a series of booming stomps, as Big Fish took a running jump.

The compound doors thundered at some colossal tackle, and fell down flat with a bang. Captain Atha watched furiously from the wall as a giant, a savage and someone coated in mud ran for cover in the firefight chaos. They were yelling and waving urgently, helping the tribe’s elders and children escape through the perimeter gates.

‘Get those fucking guns back online!’ Atha roared at the teams across the walls, taking up his rifle. He lined up a headshot on the giant fish-looking thing destroying the compound. Before he could steady his sights for the shot, a gunner shoved past him. Atha turned and watched furiously as his yelling troops ran from their artillery.

‘Get back to your posts!’ he screamed at them. They were yelling to him, to get away. Turning around, Atha looked off to the mountain in horror.

Tabitha flared Seven’s jets and launched him at the fortress, her eyes fixed on those dead artillery turrets. Snarling demonic as they shot past the quarried foothills. Laserfire erupted from the fortress walls. Shouting soldiers, aiming their rifles. She didn’t care any more. She’d gladly die today. Better to go out in flames than curled up in some fucking cell. She’d take the Ministry screaming down with her.

‘Show them what happens when they invade our home,’ she told Seven, as she sank through the saddle into the cockpit. Taking hold of the flight console. ‘Show them why no one fucks with Sky Tribe.’ Seven snarled fire, white eyes shining, as his engines thundered and he shot for the base like all hell. Wings back, he dived deafening and punched himself through a giant turret to blow it apart in flames. Tabitha swept him over the warring compound and circled low. Roaring at the invaders, she opened his wings and hovered to hurl bursting napalm across the yelling guard towers. Melting them to white-hot ruins; crashing down as the soldiers fled. Sky Tribe cheered and howled as Seven landed in the compound. The great dark monster demolished a wall as the invaders ran for their lives.

‘Everyone, out!’ Barkless yelled to the tribe, running and pushing and punching his way through the vicious fighting. There she was. She was alive. Thank the spirits, she was alive. ‘Sea Mist!’ he said, shaking her shoulder as she fired her stolen rifle at distant troops. She turned and saw him with a look of shocked relief. She hadn’t seen him since they’d returned to their world in chains; she’d feared the worst.

‘You’re alive,’ she muttered, taking hold of his hand without a thought. The battle raged around them.

‘We need to get everyone out!’ he urged her. He waved to Deep Roots too, where the old man fired back on the invaders with the rest. ‘There!’ Barkless shouted to them, pointing to Seven’s torn-down gaps in the wall behind them. ‘Get everyone out! Now!’

‘But we have them trapped in here!’ Sea Mist replied. ‘We’ll wipe them out!’

‘We’re dying with them!’ Barkless snapped. Bodies were strewn across the compound; Sky Tribe and Guardians alike.

‘We win the war in here!’ Stone Shore roared stubbornly, taking another rifle shot at the Guardians in the distance. ‘This is where we fight! This is where we win!’

‘Listen to me!’ Barkless bellowed back furiously; louder than he ever had in his life. ‘We need to get out! Now!’

‘Why?’ said Sea Mist, confused that he’d make them retreat from their own victory. Barkless just grabbed her hand tight. Searching her eyes.

‘...Trust me,’ he said. Sea Mist nodded, and followed him away.

Tabitha screamed furiously, sweeping Seven low over the base. He fed on her anger, blowing brighter flames that lit the grey world like lightning. With a yell and a thought, she and Seven incinerated the northern wall completely. The invaders ran terrified.

How dare you treat my family like that!? she screamed in the cockpit; pushing her boiling black thoughts into Seven’s. Who the fuck do you think you are!? Seven turned his head and torched turrets to melting slop. The wall’s huge armoured barriers collapsed in molten bursts; the few gunners still firing on them burned to ash in a glowing flood. Sweeping low over the shouting Guardians, Tabitha rose her seat to take the saddle. Watching yelling troops fire on Seven uselessly. She spotted the same blue-skinned man in armour, staring at her down below. That stern-faced captain who’d commanded the troops out on the plains. Atha. He was aiming his rifle to fire on her; staring up furiously. Tabitha tilted Seven to watch him. Hovering above, to give the captain his shot. Daring him. Atha’s bright shot whipped up at her and missed. In return, she pointed Seven at another lifeless turret and melted it apart in rushing white flames. Glancing over at the far side of the compound, she saw Barkless leading the tribe away. Falling back through the ruined wall, and ducking laserfire from the yelling Guardians as they shot back. They were escaping into the forest with the Ghosts; to their elders and cubs among the trees. Tabitha turned back and watched Atha, pointing and yelling at his troops to fire on them in his burning base. Maybe the soldiers thought the tribe was retreating. More like leaving them to their fate. She thumped Seven down in their way, barring the troops’ glancing shots at the running tribe behind her. Shielding them. Watching the panicked fortress around her; returning the favour for Sacred Mountain and their home. Staring hatefully, as Seven drew a breath in the sudden silence.

‘Burn it.’

Escaping into the forest in their hundreds, the tribe looked back from the trees at a blinding hellfire roar. Nothing they’d ever seen compared with the flaming wrath behind them. Their toppling prison was a chorus of screams. Like some white-hot underworld had come bursting up through the glowing rocks to obliterate it. The cold air grew to vast glowing mist where it met the flames; flashing and flickering like a stormcloud over the lakeshore. The invaders were pouring out in panic for the forest, as the Sky Queen scorched their toppling fortress from the world. The hills flickered in light and echoed with wails, from a raging mountain of pale ghost-fire. A sight the Sky Tribe couldn’t forget; the day their queen came back. Hundreds of invaders ran from the molten ruins before they were caught in the flames. Pouring panicked through the armoured gates and the broken wall; running for the sheltered gloom of the forest. And the tribe.

‘Fall back!’ Captain Atha yelled desperately in the compound, watching his gunners shouting and panicked in the towering flames around them. Dragging a wounded woman away before she burned alive. ‘Fall back!’ he bellowed across the base, pointing them terrified for the distant trees beyond the broken wall. He tried to lead them around the burning ruins, away from the trees that hid the tribe. But their eyes were everywhere in the forest, surrounding them. Ducking away behind the trees, as his panicked troops fired back. Countless spirits, haunting them in the glowing mist. There was an earthquake tremor behind them, as the black monster landed down outside the walls. Torching a blazing trench to drive them forward. The spreading flames forced them on toward the trees, and the snarling tribe. Surrounded.

‘Fire!’ Atha bellowed hoarsely. ‘Fight back, to the last man!’

‘Surrender, and live!’ came the Sky Queen’s voice behind them. Pale flames roared and crackled in the heavy silence.

‘...Captain?’ said a terrified soldier uncertainly, as they pushed in closer around him. Silent, and afraid. No escape. The monster in the flames behind them; the beasts in the forest ahead.

‘...Drop your weapons,’ Atha sighed in defeat. Silence. Slowly, one by one, their rifles clattered to the ground around him. A howl from the forest brought the growling tribe forward; surrounding the soldiers and forcing them to their knees. Behind them the Sky Queen dropped from the monster’s saddle; walking across the concrete landing ground with the inferno at her back. Atha froze in fear when some huge scarred tribal gripped his throat, growling guttural in his face. His troops were shouting and trying to fight back at the sight; the tribals beat them down. Atha’s feet dangled as Stone Shore lifted him by the collar. The savage bared his snarling fangs in a creased bloody snout, ready to rip his head away. Staring into his shaking soul.

‘He’s mine!’ said the Sky Queen, walking over. The beaten shouting soldiers turned to watch her. Death in her strange eyes. Black claws, sprung and sparking. Stone Shore obeyed, and dropped Atha to his knees. The man gulped in the fire-crackling silence; breathing the smoky air. The Sky Queen just held his look. She glanced back, at the molten ruins of the fortress. The bodies. A deathly glowing mist over the world. She watched him in silence.

‘...When does this end?’ she said, exhausted. ‘How many more lives is this worth?’ Atha looked around silently, and saw death. Knelt and broken, before the flaming horror he’d brought on himself. On his troops. ‘How many more people will the Ministers give you, to throw on that fire?’ said Tabitha, glancing back at the flames. ‘How many more sons and daughters aren’t going home?’ she stared at him. ‘...Just as many as it takes?’ she said bitterly. Atha watched her, and said nothing. ‘Tell me how many times we’re going to do this,’ she snarled furiously. Bloody and grieving. ‘Tell me how many fucking times!’ Atha didn’t have any words; he just stared. All those corpses he’d made, all those families he’d broken, on this gods-forsaken world.

...I’ve served with half these people for years, he told himself. They were my friends. My family. I’ve been getting them killed, and for what? Orders? Fucking gold? Atha gulped, breathing heavily; lost in a stinging thought. The worst thought of all.

How can I face my kids after this? ...I joined the Guardians to serve people, to give my family a better life. How did I fall this far?

‘...If you’re going to kill me, just do it,’ he sighed, resigning himself to it. Meeting her stare. ‘Do it!’ he snapped. Gods know, I deserve it. The Sky Queen watched him hatefully. Her tired bloody tribe, gathered around them, and the black burning beast at her back. Tabitha reached for Barkless Tree’s knife in her belt. She pulled it gladly as she walked closer. Looking around at her tribe where they watched and snarled, clutching bloody wounds. She watched the men and women they held at their feet; these invaders. People they’d warned, and warned again. Now, this. Tabitha raised the knife in the still silence. She gripped Atha hard by the hair as he knelt, and pulled his head back to bare his neck. She stared into those hard frightened eyes, and pressed the cruel glass blade to his throat. The tribe was growling all around her; teeth bared. Lusting for revenge. Atha’s quick panicked breaths in the silence. He was staring up at her.

‘Do it,’ he said. Tabitha clenched her jaw.

Enough. She dropped the knife and punched him. Hard. Knocked him out cold on the ground. Her fists were clenched and sparking; arms trembling. Desperate to pounce and lay into him, and beat the shit out of him. He deserved that much, at least. But she held herself back. The crowd stared. Tabitha bit back her rage, for something more. Watching her retainers; her tribe. Her Ghosts. There had to be something more than this. Something better, than just endless retaliation. For once in her life, she owned a moment completely. What happened next... didn’t have to be how it always was. She gripped Atha tight by the collar, and dragged him away through the staring crowd.

56

‘Sit,’ Tabitha snarled, shoving Atha down hard by a tree in a gnarled ancient grove. Sea Mist and Barkless lashed him tight to the trunk with rough ropes.

‘I’m a sacrifice?’ Atha said nervously, as the tribe appeared silently in the misty dell around them. Dragging his deputies roughly from the crowd to tie them against the trees.

‘You’re a witness,’ Tabitha growled at him. She produced something from her belt and shoved it into Atha’s tied hands. A cold rock. ‘Watch them,’ she told Stone Shore. He nodded obediently, and rounded up a few warriors to build a fire close by and keep watch. Tabitha led the tribe away, leaving Atha and his deputies sat tied to the twisted trees.

‘Are you alright, Captain?’ said the nearest soldier, once the tribe had left them in the eerie grove. ‘Captain?’ Stone Shore walked over and pressed his knife to the soldier’s throat. He stared into his terrified eyes, and convinced him to be quiet before he strode away. But Atha just sat in shivering silence, looking around the dim mossy clearing. The place was filled with pale standing stones, painted in sad black swirls like ghostly markers. Graves. He stared at the fist-sized rock in his hands, where the Sky Queen had pressed it hard. Gold.

Atha and his soldiers sat sleeplessly through a night of corpses. The Sky Tribe came back in small groups through the night; hundreds of them, carrying their dead from the battle. Crying and snarling at him as they dug up the ground. Chanting and praying, holding one another close, as they lay their sons and daughters in the dirt. Once their graves were filled, and the sad stones rolled over and painted, the cries began. A broken, throaty, banshee wail. Fathers snarled and tore their fur. Mothers fell down weeping at the graves of their children. Crying to the moon and stars in sore throats; wailing in heartbreak. Screaming wild raging curses at the soldiers by the trees, for taking their families away.

The funerals continued through the night. Atha looked with piercing horror at every family he’d destroyed; forced to think of his own. He saw the weak and the old trembling; holding one another by fresh graves. He watched tiny cubs cry their bright eyes out, mewling and sobbing that a parent hadn’t come back from the pens.

One sad tired woman had to bury three. Husband, daughter, son. She broke down in grief once they were buried, and saw Atha, and stormed over screaming with wild tearful eyes that shone in the moonlight. Stone Shore stepped in quickly to stop her clawing Atha’s face. Staring into the eyes of that screaming broken woman, who’d lost everything she’d lived for in one grey violent day, Atha was afraid. Not of the tribe, but of himself.

After a lull in the wailing burials came a distant timber creak. Faint at first, but growing gigantic. An eerie glow, on the night-dark summit beyond the trees. Atha and his soldiers watched something rising, away on the mountain clearing. He realised where it was, and what it must be; the hall of branches they’d burned to the ground. The Sky Queen and her great black terror were regrowing it; sending it reaching up into the starry night sky. Lit with a living glow behind its dark beams and latticeworks, like nothing they’d ever seen. Growing visibly on the mountainside while they watched.

Tabitha climbed down from Seven’s lowering head, patting his scales with a smile, and studied their work on New Havenhall. The dark woody vines could use more growth around the doorway, she thought. A wider pair of curving pillars would make a stronger archway than last time, and a lower ceiling would keep in the heat. Fishbowl handed her more moonflowers, to grow thick struts along its sides. She had to finish the hall tonight, and not just for the tribe. She had to show these invaders how little damage they could do to this world. That it was them who’d lost everything they’d worked for. That they’d never destroy Sky Tribe; not with all the guns and soldiers in the Ministry worlds. Hands on hips, Tabitha studied her work. She climbed back to Seven’s shoulders, and had him lift her up again to cover the new roof.

It took hours, but they were getting there. Exhausted, Tabitha sighed and stepped back from the hall’s finished shell.

‘Good work,’ she told Fishbowl warmly, taking an arm gently in her hand. Feeling the tentacle tapping a volted hello against her palm. The creature had been up here all along, ever since she’d left for Serenity. Still keeping its wildflower garden beside her hidden old hut. Lost to the world and all its insanities; silently tending its plants.

‘I’m so glad you’re ok, mate,’ Tabitha said quietly. She smiled as the creature floated off to tidy its garden. Watching it. Fishbowl didn’t cry, and it didn’t stop. It just rolled with the punches and rebuilt, over and over. It had its duty, and never stopped working. It never gave up.

‘...What is she?’ Big Fish muttered to Aelu, watching Tabitha work from across the clearing. Pushing current into dark towering branches, as the surreal building took shape.

The tribe gathered to watch as the Sky Queen latticed and layered new walls inside, faster than before. Rising from the ruins. They watched as she set glowing moonflower lights in their hall, and crowned it with spines, and sparked a new fire in its dirt-floored heart. Aelu and Big Fish stared around at it all, as they followed the happy tribe inside. There by the Hearthfire, exhausted and smiling, the Sky Queen welcomed them home.

Tabitha sat wearily in a corner with her Ghosts and retainers, and finally had some time to spend with Deep Roots and Sea Mist. Many of the tribe had collapsed in corners with their cubs, warm and sheltered from the howling wind. Others were walking across the clearing, bringing wood for the Hearthfire. Pulling low dying branches from the pines to build the crackling flames. Sea Mist and Stone Shore brought rocks in to ring it, as more and more gathered around the warm burning heart of their home. Deep Roots asked for silence, and led them in a chorus of prayer to First Ancestor. Tabitha listened carefully to the old familiar chant; the words she’d been trying to learn.

...With holy hands, he struck the first flame in the darkness. He taught Fierce-Hope, the Ancient Way, as they gathered round. Aelu and Big Fish were watching the tribe beside her. Friends and families, just glad to be alive. The tired and grieving, holding each other close in their loss. Gathered around the fire, in hope.

‘Help them,’ said Tabitha, as the scrawny junkie and the lonely giant watched in silence. ‘Build their fires, and hunt their food. They’ll bring you into their tribe. You’ll always have a home here.’

‘...I’d like that,’ Aelu said quietly, watching cubs adding sticks to the fire. Still laughing in their small clear voices, even now. Big Fish smiled and put a hand around her shoulder, and held the sad woman close to his side.

Tabitha returned to Atha the next morning, in the burial grove below the mountain. A broken man tied to a tree. Pale and sleepless, Atha and his deputies watched her in zombie silence. He’d dropped the gold; it looked like he’d tried to kick it away in the night.

‘Do you have children?’ Tabitha asked him, in the dawn silence. She brought the big chunk of gold back to force it into his hands.

‘I don’t want to hold that,’ he muttered.

‘No, it’s yours,’ Tabitha insisted, bitterly. Shoving it into his hands. ‘You’ve earned it. I hope it makes you very happy,’ she snarled. ‘You didn’t answer my question. Do you have children?’

‘Yes,’ said Atha, staring at the fresh graves in the cold wind.

‘Yeah. Well, so did they,’ Tabitha replied, looking at the painted headstones. ‘Until you.’ Watching him, that tortured look in his eyes, the man was a wreck.

‘My kids... I can’t let them see me again,’ he said, heartbroken. ‘Not after what I’ve done.’

‘No, I want them to,’ Tabitha replied, standing over him. ‘I want you to tell them what happened here. I want them to see who you really are. What you came here to take, and what you left behind.’

‘I only took this job for my kids,’ Atha mumbled, staring into nothing. Tears rolling down his cheeks. ‘The pay was ridiculous... more than I could make in a lifetime. I just wanted to give my kids a better life than mine.’ Tabitha stared hatefully, and said nothing.

‘But I never wanted this,’ Atha muttered, in a broken tone. Staring at all those graves; shaking his head in shock. ‘I never wanted this.’ Tabitha just watched him; her hard expression softening to a sad gold stare.

‘...Then help me stop the ones who do.’

57

‘Atha to Orbit,’ he said solemnly into his wristcom. Tabitha stood beside him, as the Sky Tribe led their captives into the clearing.

‘Captain! Are you alright!?’ a voice crackled in response.

‘All forces, stand down,’ he sighed. ‘I repeat. All forces, stand down.’

‘Captain?’

‘Lienna, that’s a direct order,’ he said. ‘This is no longer an active conflict. The indigenous are releasing their captives back to us. Send all available dropships with full medic facilities, to evacuate all troops to the Vigilance.’ He paused at the grim thought. ‘...And to bring back our dead.’

‘Right away, Captain,’ the crackling voice replied.

‘So what now?’ said Tabitha, walking alongside him. ‘You all just go home and forget about this?’

‘I can’t forget about this,’ Atha sighed. He stared at the melted ruins of the base below the mountain. ‘...You could’ve killed me. But you gave me a second chance. I intend to use it,’ he told her, quietly. ‘I can’t pretend it’s fine any more, what we’ve been doing here. Destroying lives. I don’t want that to be my legacy.’

‘So, you’re going back to the Ministry worlds?’ said Tabitha.

‘No, I can’t go back there. Not now,’ he replied. ‘The Four would hunt me down.’

‘The Four?’ said Tabitha. ‘...You mean the top ministers?’ Atha nodded darkly.

‘They have to think our work here is ongoing,’ he said. ‘So, I’ll keep sending my reports as usual. Try to confuse things. This far out, news travels slow. It should give us some time, before the Ministers start asking questions.’

‘Time for what?’ said Tabitha.

‘Whatever it is you’re planning to do,’ Atha replied, expectantly. ‘This rebellion you’ve started. I assume you have a plan, for the military starship I’m about to surrender to you.’

‘Yeah. I do,’ Tabitha replied, poker-faced. Lying through her teeth.

‘We need a plan,’ Tabitha said hurriedly, waving her retainers to Havenhall with Aelu and Big Fish. Well out of sight of Captain Atha, who joined the Guardian captives awaiting their dropships.

‘Atha’s going to help us,’ Tabitha told them, as they sat around the hearthfire. ‘He’s giving us one of those warships.’

‘Nice,’ Aelu chuckled, glancing around at them. Big Fish looked shocked. Sea Mist, Barkless and Roots weren’t sure what’d been said.

‘Those things can bomb from orbit,’ Big Fish rumbled. ‘It’s probably what they used to level this place,’ he added, looking around at the new hall.

‘It’s enough firepower to take out any Ministry target you want,’ said Aelu. ‘Assuming that you want to take the fight to them.’

‘We’re not going to bring down the Ministry with one warship,’ Tabitha replied. ‘We need another way.’

‘Like what?’ said Big Fish.

‘...I don’t know,’ Tabitha admitted. ‘I need to think.’

‘Well whatever you’re going to do, do it fast,’ said Aelu. ‘Sooner or later, the Ministry’s going to find out that their smash and grab here didn’t go to plan.’

‘Then come the big reinforcements. And we’re all dead,’ said Big Fish. Everyone stared at him. ‘Just trying to keep our spirits up,’ he added.

‘Tabitha, I wish I could help. But I don’t know what to tell you,’ Aelu sighed. ‘Short of pointing that warship straight at the Ministry headquarters, until they meet your demands... I wouldn’t know where to start.’

‘Or use it to start a rebel fleet, out in The Rim,’ Big Fish offered. ‘You’d need to work fast, though. The Ministry’s always gonna have us outnumbered.’

‘...Let me think about it,’ Tabitha replied, feeling the pressure mounting on her. Getting up to walk outside.

‘In any event, we need to move quickly,’ Aelu advised her. Rubbing a sore temple, and the withdrawal headache pounding beneath it. ‘We’ve finally got a head start on the Ministry. We can’t afford to lose it.’

‘I know,’ Tabitha sighed, stressing out. ‘Just give me a little while.’

What do you think? she asked Seven urgently, holding her palm on his snout. What would you do? She waited to hear his reply.

‘Seven, how many times do I need to tell you? We’re not going out in a blaze of glory,’ she scolded him, as she felt his response in her head. ‘Seriously. That’s your answer to everything.’ Tabitha sat and studied his colourful thoughts, losing hope. He wasn’t being much help. Every idea he came up with involved taking the starship, and him, and smashing through whatever this Ministry was and blowing everything up. And/or burning everything to the ground, followed by the standard going out in a blaze of glory. The fact that she didn’t want to massacre countless citizens in the process was something of a hurdle. Tabitha sighed uselessly, and rubbed Seven’s snout. Pacing around in the clearing beside him. Stressing out over what the hell they should do next. Everyone was waiting for this big plan she didn’t have. Counting on her not to get them killed.

I don’t know, she growled to herself, getting more frustrated by the second. I can’t do this stuff. I don’t know!

‘Kha V’ha,’ said Deep Roots, walking over with something in his hand.

‘Hey,’ she said, smiling past the stress. ‘What’s up?’ Roots just grinned, and opened up his hand. Pebbles.

‘This, was a good idea,’ Tabitha said gladly, as they skimmed stones across the water on the lakeshore. Just like when they’d first met. It gave her a chance to step back and think more clearly, even just for ten minutes. Seven was sweeping low over the concrete landing ground behind them. Torching and tearing it up, and having the time of his life. Burning it all to ash, so the plants and bamboo could grow back thicker in its place.

Tabitha got thinking, while Deep Roots’ skimming stones kicked her arse. She needed more people behind their cause; more Ghosts. But what could they do with just one warship?

What do I know, anyway? Well, she knew the Ministers, and how ruthless they were in getting their way. She’d seen the media censorship herself. They must’ve had more dissenters out there; more rebels in waiting. Suspects. Using their Guardian ship, and a few spare uniforms – impersonating them – that could be the perfect cover to start rounding up allies on fake arrests. To form the core of their rebellion in secret, and grow. Using the Ministry’s own tools against them. That might even work, she told herself. Better than nothing, anyway.

‘Proud,’ said Deep Roots, watching her. Smiling.

‘Hm?’ Tabitha replied, looking up from her thoughts.

‘Proud. Of, you,’ said the old man, smiling his creased grin. ‘Grown,’ he said, his voice full of admiration. ‘Strong, queen. Good, queen. All Fierce-Hope. Here.’ He tapped his chest, and pointed to her. Tabitha said nothing, and smiled tearfully. She just grabbed him in a tight hug on the shore. There was a beep, on her stolen wristcom. Tapping the touchscreen, a cryptic message popped up and decoded itself. The wording was strange though; clearly intended to hide things from prying eyes:

Red.

I’m so glad you’re alright. A little bird told me that things are going smoother back home.

I heard you were tearing up the bar, and made some new friends? You should go back there soon, and ask about an artist. See if you can free anyone up for a project of his. Before someone else snaps him up.

I know you’ll do what’s right. I believe in you.

No need to reply.

‘Saa,’ Tabitha muttered, smiling widely. Her message had finally transmitted, all the way to Serenity. But Saa knew about things she hadn’t mentioned in her first message, when they’d returned to Stormworld. She sounded completely up to date.

She’s a government aide, Tabitha reminded herself. It’s her job to know. If Saa already knew what was happening here, then maybe the Ministers did too. They had to move now. Thanks to Saa, she had a lead. Maybe even a plan to start this uprising. It wasn’t perfect, but nothing ever was. She had to try.

‘Eitse? What’s on that dump?’ said Captain Atha, as a dropship landed down in the clearing to collect them. Sky Tribe stood well back from it, clutching their weapons angrily. Stone Shore reminded them that the invaders were beaten, and pledged to serve the tribe. The Sky Queen was taking them hostage; not the other way around.

‘Here, in the message,’ said Tabitha, bringing up Saa’s reply again on her wristcom.

‘I remember the wording. But I don’t understand it,’ Atha replied. ‘Who’s this artist?’

‘I don’t know,’ Tabitha admitted, waving her Ghosts and retainers onto the waiting dropship. ‘But I know where to find him.’

Tabitha smiled to her howling tribe as they saw her off; hundreds of knives raised to the sky as the ramp closed. The dropship rose and rumbled off into the blue.

‘So. We’re going back into Ministry space,’ said Atha.

‘Yeah,’ Tabitha replied. ‘And if you screw us when we get there, I’ll kill you myself.’

‘I don’t doubt it,’ Atha replied, meeting her stare. ‘Look, I’m not going back on my word,’ he sighed. ‘The Ministry’s gone too far this time.’ Deep Roots studied him from the opposite row of seats.

‘Want, forgive?’ the old man said bitterly, in broken Trade Language. ‘Stop talk. Do.’ Big Fish nodded beside him; never truer words spoken. Atha watched him, and looked down at the grated floor. He sat in silence for the rest of the flight, as the dropship rumbled and shook through the atmosphere. Seven swept on beside the bulky craft as it roared out into the stars, for the twin warships lurking over the world.

‘Attention, all personnel,’ Atha said sternly into his wristcom. ‘As of now we are serving strictly as peacekeepers. Pending diplomatic negotiations.’ His voice echoed through the warship’s speakers as he led Tabitha and her Ghosts from the hangar. Sparse crewmembers stopped and stared at the strange group, as they entered the spotless main corridor.

‘Oh, don’t get too close to him,’ Tabitha called back into the hangar, waving the flight crew away from Seven. ‘He’s, er... just don’t get too close.’ The wondering crew nodded and stared, backing away cautiously from the growling terror. When some weird tentacled orb slid from its hatch and went floating around them, half the small crew dropped their tools and ran.

‘New orders,’ Atha continued into his wristcom, vague but commanding. ‘The Defiance will return to Serenity with the Sky Queen immediately, for renewed talks with the Ministry. The Vigilance will remain here and await further orders. I want everything stowed and secure. We leave immediately.’

‘Yes Captain!’ a host of voices crackled through his wristcom.

‘With these fugitives aboard, Captain?’ said a passing officer, as Atha led them on down the corridor. ‘Sir, with all due respect... is this wise?’ Atha stopped suddenly with two clomping boot steps, and saw red. He turned and stared into the officer’s frightened eyes so fiercely that he could have bored two flaming holes through his skull.

‘Do you know the penalty for questioning orders from your commanding officer?’

‘I-I–

‘Do you know the penalty for questioning orders from your commanding officer!?’

‘Yes sir!’ he shouted back obediently.

‘Then don’t, fucking, question them!’ Atha bellowed in his face.

‘Yes sir!’ he barked back, with the fear of god in his eyes. Atha gave him one last glare and walked off, his boots thumping on down the spartan corridor, as he led the Ghosts to the ship’s bridge. Aelu shared a look with Tabitha beside her, raising her eyebrows at the outburst; she glanced back at Big Fish as he zipped his mouth shut. But Barkless and her retainers kept to themselves, in their uneasy peace aboard the demons’ ship. These were the ones who’d been killing their people, after all. But it was like she’d told them; she couldn’t do this without them. Without their help, nothing would change.

‘...There’s no one here,’ Big Fish rumbled, as they walked past room after room of empty bunks and unused equipment.

‘I’ve ordered all troops aboard the Vigilance,’ Atha replied, nodding to the second warship beyond the windows. ‘We’re running on minimal crew here. Gives us better deniability. Fewer witnesses, if this all goes sideways. Most of my troops wouldn’t help you anyway.’

‘Because we’ve been killing each other in a senseless war,’ Tabitha said bluntly.

‘...Yeah,’ Atha sighed, bitterly. ‘And now we’re working together to stop it, yes?’

‘That’s right,’ Tabitha replied sternly. A sudden fresh tension between them. If not for the bigger picture, to save Stormworld, she’d happily hit him again.

‘Sleeping quarters and mess hall are on this main corridor,’ Atha continued, changing the subject. Leading them on. ‘These are the rec rooms, for crew downtime. I’d appreciate it if you stayed out, and avoid my crew wherever possible. At least for the time being.’

‘I understand, Captain,’ Tabitha replied, trying to keep things civil between them. More to remind herself, to put her own angry feelings aside. This was bigger than either of them. She glanced at someone staring from the rec rooms; a lean red woman in a vest and combat trousers. The woman got up quickly, alarmed, and rushed over with a pistol drawn.

‘Captain! These are... they’re enemies of the state!’ she said urgently, aiming her gun at Tabitha in panic.

‘Don’t,’ Tabitha warned her snarling retainers; she put her arm out to stop them pouncing on the woman. Big Fish had to hold Sea Mist back from knifing her.

‘They’re cooperating with the Guardians now, Private,’ Atha replied sternly. ‘That sidearm should’ve been returned to the armoury,’ he added, looking at her pistol. ‘Sign it in. Now.’

‘But they’re still designated armed and dangerous, Captain? Priority one!?’ the woman replied desperately, looking to him in confusion. Still aiming her gun at Tabitha. ‘There’s emergency warrants on them, direct from the Ministry! Why are they with you!? ...Why aren’t they detained?’ Watching Atha hesitating, trying to find a way around it, Tabitha reached out fast and shocked her. The red woman shook and collapsed.

‘Seemed easier,’ Tabitha said with a shrug.

‘Appreciated,’ Atha replied, smirking. Kneeling down to put the private in cuffs. ‘There’s always a jobsworth. Every time.’ He raised his wristcom to speak into it. ‘All personnel,’ he said, his voice carrying through both ships. ‘Clearly, my orders weren’t understood. I repeat, the Sky Queen and her bodyguards will accompany me aboard the Defiance, freely, to commence fresh negotiations with the Ministry. All crew are to stand down and await my further orders. Don’t piss me off.’

‘Yes sir!’ came the chorus of replies.

‘So now you’re a fugitive too?’ said Big Fish, lifting the stunned woman to follow Atha to a nearby cell. He lay her down inside.

‘I’ve screwed my employers,’ Atha replied quietly, locking the cell door. ‘When they find out, I’m dead. Unless I can help you take them down for good, before they reach us. So whatever you’re doing with my ship, do it now.’

‘That strange message, on your wristcom,’ said Atha, as he led Tabitha and the Ghosts through whispering blast doors to the ship’s gleaming bridge. ‘Mind telling me who it’s from?’

‘A friend,’ Tabitha replied, cryptically. ‘Before we do this Captain, are you sure you’re on our side?’

‘Look. This whole thing is fucked up,’ Atha sighed, watching countless stars through the ship’s giant canopy. ‘I joined the Guardians when they were a police force. I signed up to help people.’

‘And it pays better than most jobs outside Serenity,’ Big Fish chipped in.

‘It used to,’ Atha admitted. ‘Now all the money’s in military work. All the old beat cops lost their incentives. The rookies got to play with the big guns. Where it’s all been heading, the past few years...’

‘Turning into the Ministry’s personal army,’ Aelu added. ‘Replacing all the world militaries. It’s why my husband left.’ Atha nodded.

‘Well, I didn’t sign up for all this,’ he sighed, watching Stormworld’s vast curve against the stars. ‘But, I didn’t challenge it either. I just took every promotion, and told myself it was all for the kids,’ he said, shamefully. ‘The Ministry’s changed us, one step at a time. Years ago, I drew the line at taking lives. Clearly, that’s something I forgot.’

‘Well I wish you’d fucking remembered it sooner,’ Tabitha snapped angrily. Atha met her stare and looked away, full of regret.

‘Look. I can’t change what I’ve done. And no apology’s going to make it right. I know that won’t change anything. But if you want my help, to stop my employers... you’ve got it,’ Atha sighed heavily. ‘This shit has to stop. They’ve got us scared, and we turn a blind eye to it,’ he said grimly. ‘...But you don’t. So take the ship. Use my crew.’

‘Alright,’ Tabitha replied. ‘But don’t think I’m going to thank you for it. Personally, I still want to kill you for everything you’ve done.’ The sparse crew on the bridge looked around at her. ‘But, that won’t change anything either,’ she sighed. ‘If you’re offering your help, and a chance to make things right for that world... I don’t have the right to take your life.’

‘Do what you need to,’ Atha replied. There was a subtle desperate look in his eyes, hidden from his crew. Asking her, finally, for a chance at redemption. Tabitha held his stare, and nodded.

‘...Alright. Take us to Eitse,’ she said.

‘Set a course,’ Atha told his pilot, who nodded at his console. ‘Why are we going to that dump, anyway?’

‘It’s your ship, Captain,’ Tabitha replied. ‘You tell me.’ Atha nodded and thought it over.

‘It’s the nearest viable industrial station,’ he replied. ‘We need mission-critical repairs, before we head on for Serenity.’ Satisfied at the pretext, Tabitha took a seat while the giant warship rumbled and turned aside. Crawling away on a new course through the stars.

‘So. You’re going to Eitse for emergency repairs,’ Tabitha concurred. ‘Incidentally, there’s an artist in a certain bar nearby. They may be able to help the Guardians with a covert operation. They’re going to have to come with you.’ Atha nodded and turned back to the bridge, as the hulking warship moved faster and faster toward the void. A sharp silhouette, sliding away from Stormworld’s bright curve. Engines glowing as it hurtled into star-bleeding lightspeed.

‘I’ve got a lead on this artist from Eitse, Captain,’ said Atha’s comms officer, turning from his bright console. Glancing over, Tabitha saw that he wore a sealed bodysuit and a full-headed breather mask; just like the Economic Minister on Serenity. The same small, six-limbed species.

‘Calls himself the Artist of the Free,’ the officer told Atha beside him. Both of them studying the mugshot on the screen.

‘Any convictions?’ said Atha, sipping from a steaming cup.

‘No, Captain. He’s on the watch list for acts of dissent, and creative works inciting rebellion. A film maker. He’s renting a room over a bar, by the spaceport here.’ The officer brought up a glowing city map on the screen.

‘What’s this?’ Atha chuckled. ‘A Guardian, doing actual police work?’

‘Just glad not to be a hired gun any more, Captain,’ the officer replied happily.

‘Not even for that salary?’ said Atha, quietly.

‘Not after what we did to earn it, sir,’ the small creature replied, with grief in his voice.

‘Got that right,’ Atha muttered, guilt-ridden. ‘Good work finding this Artist, anyway.’

‘Thank you sir.’

‘Did you say he’s a film maker?’ said Tabitha, beyond disappointed, coming over to study her contact on the screen. She’d expected a rebel general, or... something. Maybe a runaway robot bounty hunter, whose “art” was mayhem and violence. Someone wanted, dead or alive. Or at least a grizzled bastard with a dramatic scar down their eye, like in the movies. Someone who’d actually help them to fight. A film maker? Seriously?

‘What the hell is Saa thinking?’ she mumbled, turning to the others.

‘Who’s Saa?’ said Big Fish. Sea Mist and Barkless tried to sign to him to explain, while Deep Roots snored in a corner.

‘He’s a rebel, then. This Artist,’ said Aelu, joining Tabitha to study his photo. ‘Can’t say I recognise him, from my time there... but a lot of people pass through that bar.’

‘But what’re we supposed to do with a film maker?’ said Tabitha, still puzzling over Saa’s choice.

‘...Don’t make me say it,’ Aelu sighed, walking away. ‘You can’t be that dumb.’

‘Oi!’ said Tabitha, shocked and smiling. ‘Right. If we go back in that bar, you’re getting your arse handed to you this time.’

‘Bring it on,’ Aelu laughed, relaxing in her seat. Chewing on more high-inducing root the tribe had given her, to help with her hellish withdrawal.

‘You’re not going back to that bar. Either of you,’ Big Fish warned them. ‘Smashing the place up like that,’ he muttered to himself, mournfully. ‘I liked that bar.’

58

In a dingy watering hole on Eitse, close to a run-down spaceport, the bar’s fretting owner carried in boxes of new drinks glasses through the pouring rain. Replacing the old ones that’d been smashed up in a brawl, between some red-haired creature and that homeless junkie; though thankfully he hadn’t seen either of them since. Gods knew where his doorman had disappeared to; he was only supposed to break up the fight outside. But with everyone telling him that all three were fugitives, and on the run from the Guardians, maybe it was better if he just got a new doorman and didn’t ask. A couple of tables were out of action too, and one of those would need replacing. As if he had the money to spare. The bar owner wiped his rainsoaked forehead, rubbed his weary reptilian eyes, and unpacked the new glasses. Washing them out and watching his gloomy damp-smelling patrons, exhausted from another day in the factories.

Further down the dim neon bar, a green man with a long face hunched and chattered over his fifth drink. Pushing his slick hair back from his eyes.

‘See, people like me... we don’t juz get to relax like everyoneelse,’ he slurred.

‘Uh-huh,’ the pretty bartender replied, disinterested. Pouring him another.

‘Annd, I’llbehonest. Izz kindof a dangerous way to live,’ he confided, with a pained expression. He trailed his finger through a tiny puddle of spilled spirit, to make it a shining wet starburst on the bar top. ‘Mylineofwork? It takes cconstant vigilance, from the razor’s edge. I ply my ttrade at the tip of the spear. The... vvery tip,’ he assured her, pointing a finger. ‘It’s a never-ending battle of knowledge and prrception, with the Powers That Be. Every day, dicing wwith death. Always on the *hic* on the run. Always looking ba *hic* back overmy shoulder. But, thaz my art,’ he concluded solemnly, nodding to himself. He glanced over his shoulder around the rest of the bar, as if he was being watched by shadowy informants. ‘...That’s my art.’

‘You want an umbrella in this?’ said the bartender.

‘Hm? Oh. Yes please,’ he replied, looking up from his drink. Happily taking his next colourful cocktail from her. He paused, deep in swaying thought. ‘...WhawasItalkinabout?’

‘Your art.’

‘Oh yeah. ...So yeah, heh, ffunny story actually. I was out innthe Rim, shooting this really kind of ccontroversial exposé on what the lllabourers get in their ffood out there?’ she was intrigued; he could tell. ‘Didyouknow. That around sseventy purse hhent of alllthe meat they serve in the workkitchens out there, is actually–

‘Yeah, you told me already,’ the bartender cut in, with a bored tone. ‘Here’s your drink. I’m just gonna... go over here. For a while,’ she told him, walking off to take cover by her regulars.

‘Alllright. Goodtalking to you,’ he grinned, staggering his fresh drink up to his mouth. The bar was quickly clearing out behind him, as three boot-clomping figures walked in.

‘Irren Amsira?’ said a hard voice behind him.

‘I prefferr to go by The Artist, if you don’tmind, friend,’ he replied into his glass. Looking around unsteadily on his bar stool. He froze in terror at three armed Guardians standing behind him, in full combat suits. All masked helmets and pale glowing lenses; those stark black dots stared into his soul. The foremost officer clamped an armoured hand on his shoulder.

‘Sir, you’d better come with us,’ said the glaring mask. The drunk man said nothing. He just stared, terrified, as they marched him out of the bar to their dropship.

Atha’s officers escorted the man known as the Artist to the ship’s bridge, back in orbit. It took a while.

‘It’s good to meet you,’ Tabitha said warmly. She shook his hand, as he wandered in unsteadily; watching his face change from fear to dread when he looked down at her hard black fingers. She could smell the booze on him. The man just stood there swaying; afraid. He took one look at Big Fish and tried to back out through the door.

‘Areyougonna qquestion me? Or int herrogate me? I’ll tellyouanythin,’ he said, holding his hands out in shaking surrender. Swaying where he stood, but somehow staying upright. He was hypnotic to watch; a drunken master. Roots, Barkless and Sea Mist stared at him in fascination. He studied the strange group watching him, and a penny dropped. He pointed at Tabitha in sudden realisation. Eyes wide and mouth open; no words coming out. ‘Wwait! I know whoyouare, you’re the Skkyqueen! I’m no one. You don’thaveto set your beast people on me. I’ll tell you anythin you wannaknow. I’ll talk! I-I’ll talk.’ He staggered to his knees, shaking his head at the floor in despair. ‘I’ll talk.’

‘What?’ said Tabitha, looking around at the others. ‘At any of that?’

‘...Beast people?’ said Big Fish. Hurt.

‘Look. Just sober up first, ok?’ Aelu said gently, taking his hand to help him up. Guiding him away down the corridor. ‘I’ll make you a hot drink, how’s that?’

‘Ohhh. That’dbe amaazing,’ he told her, in total relief.

‘And don’t worry. No one’s here to interrogate you,’ she said. ‘We’re not really with the Guardians,’ she confided, quietly. ‘We just want to talk to you about a project, if you’re interested.’

‘A Project?’ he said, intrigued. Suddenly putting his hands on his hips, at this serious turn of events. Swaying where he stood, like his bones worked part-time. ‘A Ffilm Project?’

‘That’s right,’ Aelu replied, their voices shrinking away as she walked with him down the corridor.

‘I make ffilms,’ he told her brightly, tapping his chest. ‘What a coincidence!’

‘What are the chances?’ Aelu agreed, smiling. ‘But let’s get you straightened out first, ok?’

‘Alllright,’ he said, approving their plan, and followed her lead down the corridor. Tabitha smiled as she watched Aelu go. She didn’t see a trace of the scared angry woman she’d first met in that bar; or the snarky former-addict she’d been growing into. The woman she saw now was a mother. Gentle, patient, and kind. Even if Saa’s wobbly contact didn’t inspire her total confidence in this rebellion.

‘I’ve said it a thousand times since I came out of the water,’ Big Fish rumbled in the corner. Shaking his head. ‘I am never drinking what you people drink.’

‘Where are we going next?’ said Atha, from the heart of the bridge. ‘We can’t stay here. We’ll draw too much attention.’

‘The safest place would be the Rim,’ Big Fish replied. Tabitha stifled a smirk.

‘The Rim?’ said Atha, looking at the giant like he was mad. ‘What the hell’s in the–

‘Just do it,’ Tabitha commanded him. Her retainers glanced at her approvingly.

‘...Yes ma’am,’ Atha sighed, reluctantly. He nodded to his pilot to set a new course. Engines glowing gigantic, their warship shot away for the stars.

‘So. You’re sparking a rebellion,’ said Irren, the green-scaled filmmaker. A little brighter and easier now he was sobering up. Sitting with the Ghosts around a large table in the ship’s briefing room, as they ate and brought him up to speed.

‘That’s the plan, anyway,’ Aelu replied, chewing a sporkful of tasty mush from a steel dinner tray.

‘Alright. Well, you know you’ll never beat the Ministry through open conflict,’ Irren concluded. ‘So you want to spark a media war instead. That, I can do.’

‘What do you have in mind?’ said Tabitha. Surprised at how quickly he’d sobered up.

‘First, we need break their monopoly on the star net. End the censorship. That means the Ministry’s critics finally get a voice,’ Irren replied. ‘Then, we lead the charge. Real journalism. To give all those worlds out there full possession of the facts. We’ll set the watchdogs on these Ministers. We’ll remind them that the people are in charge. Not them.’

‘How?’ said Tabitha. ‘What do we put in these films?’

‘One film. For now,’ Irren replied. ‘A big one. Documentaries are ok, but they don’t have that mainstream impact. We need a blockbuster exposé. Full premiere. It needs that entertainment factor. We’ll show the people of federated space the truth: that they’re being ruled by their least worthy. We need to present a counter-narrative. We’ll just... hold up the mirror, until society’s disgusted by what it sees. If we do it right, it’ll inspire billions of people to do the same. Make people hungry for change. We just need to end that censorship first.’

‘One big film to open the floodgates?’ Big Fish rumbled. ‘Sign me up.’

‘Films cost money,’ Irren replied, with a smile that said there was nothing he could do about it. ‘Like I said, low-budget documentaries don’t make a splash. If you want momentum on Serenity, you need marketing. Promotion. Celebrities who agree with the cause. In a word, attention. It’s not cheap.’ Tabitha stood up, twisted a deerhide sack off her belt, and dropped several clunking rocks of gold heavily on the table. Every eye fixed on it in the sudden silence, though her retainers were indifferent. To them it was nothing but soft useless rock, churned up by those dirt-eating demons; they’d urged her to take it if it helped. If it’d keep the invaders from taking their lives and ruining their world, Deep Roots had said, a few bright stones were no price to pay. Tabitha knew they’d come to value it, maybe thousands of years from now. This was a one-off investment, to make sure those thousands of years didn’t belong to outside powers. It felt sinful to spend their gold like this, after everything they’d fought for. But they wouldn’t win any war on goodwill.

‘That enough?’ she said.

‘Should be,’ Irren replied quietly, staring at the gold. Stunned.

‘Go on then,’ said Tabitha. ‘You were saying. You’re making a film.’

‘...Alright,’ he mumbled, dragging his eyes off the gold. ‘So. Listen. The Ministry’s got so many dirty secrets hidden away, you wouldn’t even believe. Enough secrets to bury them.’

‘And why do you want to bury them?’ said Tabitha. Sipping a hot drink with a citrus taste.

‘Take your pick,’ Irren replied. ‘Mainly that I can’t just say whatever I want. My family disowned me, and I live in hiding. And I know you and your friends here have had a pretty hard time, to put it lightly. So. We’ll expose it all. I want all your testimonies on film, with superstars and secret footage. And I want it mainstream. I want to get the truth out to everyone. Around the media censorship. Trust me, all’s not well with the glorious Ministry. One look inside the halls of power is enough to turn your stomach. Though I don’t have to tell you that,’ he said, with a nod to Tabitha.

‘So where do we start?’ she replied. ‘How do we break the censorship?’

‘My life ambition. The single greatest hack in history,’ he told them quietly, his eyes lighting up. They listened closely. ‘There’s a facility,’ he began. Glancing around at his silent audience. ‘Deep-ground. Empty planet. Way out in the Rim. One of hundreds. Theory goes that there’s some weird artificial intelligence, held in permanent containment out there. Codename: The Celestial. Ancient species. Last of its kind. Capable of hacking everything. Total threat to galactic security, too dangerous to use. All that juicy stuff.’ He was huddled in close; eyes bright. Loving it. ‘Break out that intelligence, get it to hack the star net, and it could blow a hole so wide in the Ministry’s reputation that the whole thing comes crashing down. Total media war. Maybe even pave the way for something better. It’s world-changing stuff. Every world.’

‘Hm. Sounds kind of peaceful. As rebellions go,’ Big Fish said approvingly.

‘It’s modern war,’ Irren shrugged. ‘Real victory conquers minds. Not bodies.’

‘It does give us some actual odds of survival, against the Guardians,’ Aelu told Tabitha.

‘It’s quick, it’s quiet, and we can run it all right here on the ship,’ Irren added. ‘And with the Celestial on board to cloak our signals, they’ll never find us.’

‘Hm,’ said Tabitha, quietly impressed with Irren. Trying her best to hide it. Despite her doubts, Saa had really come through for them. Checking her wristcom, it was all there in her message:

Ask about an artist. See if you can free anyone up for a project of his. Before someone else snaps him up.

‘The Ministry never told us anything about any Celestial,’ said Captain Atha. ‘Why should we believe you?’

‘I don’t care if you believe me or not,’ Irren chuckled, putting his hands out like he was on trial. ‘I trust my sources, and their evidence. They’ve never let me down.’

‘Well, it’s a plan,’ Tabitha conceded, happily.

‘So, any idea where this holding facility is?’ said Aelu. ‘Where we can start looking?’

‘Oh, I know exactly where it is,’ Irren replied, with a smug smile. ‘Getting in is the problem. Place is locked up tighter than a Guardian’s – er...’ he glanced at Atha, who looked distinctly pissed off. Arms crossed, Atha raised his eyebrows expectantly for him to finish. ‘...It’s locked up. Tight,’ said Irren.

‘We’ll get in,’ Tabitha replied confidently, glancing around at her Ghosts.

‘You haven’t seen what they defend these places with,’ Irren chuckled. ‘Even just the level of military hardware they’ll be using on the surface is–

‘We’ll get in,’ Tabitha assured him.

‘Alright,’ Atha concluded, looking around at them. ‘Give me the coordinates and we’ll set a course.’ Irren quickly pulled up a string of encrypted messages on his wristcom, searching them for the coded location.

‘Atha. We’re about to carry out a military heist,’ said Tabitha. ‘...We need your help.’ Atha nodded.

‘We don’t have any time to do this properly,’ he sighed. ‘This stuff takes years. But, I’ll teach you all I can.’

The Defiance hurtled through the stars towards Irren’s secret facility. In the meantime, the Ghosts got a crash course in Guardian combat. Tabitha knew it was barely beginner stuff, compared with the troops they were going up against. But it had to be better than nothing. And anyway... they had a Seven.

‘...And switch out the charge pack like this,’ Atha instructed them, where they lined up along the ship’s firing range. ‘Drop the rifle down from your shoulder, into your workspace here. Close to your core. Support the stock in your armpit. Take your left hand off the grip, click the release, and strip the spent pack.’ He pressed the release button on the side of the laser rifle with a click, turning for them to see, and pulled the old charge pack away. He dropped it with a clunk and pulled another large battery from his belt.

‘Reload in one smooth motion,’ he told them, keeping his stance. Slowly bringing up the fresh pack from his belt to the rifle, and slotting it in with a chunky metal click. ‘Practise that until you don’t need to look. A fast reload can save your life.’ Tabitha nodded and copied his actions, with the rest of her Ghosts. She stood facing the distant targets, kitted head to toe in body armour. Dull plastic stuff that was meant to be light and easy to move in, according to Atha. It didn’t feel like it. She clicked the release switch on her laser rifle, pulled the charge pack away, and let it fall to swap in another from her belt. She brought it up quickly and clattered it into the rifle, with a solid click.

‘Good. Stock back up into your shoulder. Now arm, and aim, and fire,’ said Atha, taking her back through the proper stance again. ‘No. Bunch the rifle in tighter to yourself. Control it. That’s it.’

‘Ok,’ Tabitha replied, checking her stance again. Sighting down the rifle, to point the glowing dot on the target.

‘Try for another headshot,’ he said. ‘No. Feet wider. Lean in. Forward-aggressive,’ he instructed her. ‘Bunch the rifle in tight. That’s it.’ He glanced down the line. ‘Ready. Target.’ Tabitha squeezed the trigger and shot a screeching bolt of light past the target’s ear in the distance.

‘Better,’ said Atha. ‘It’s just repetition. For now, you need to be half that distance. If you want to hit anything.’

‘Got it,’ Tabitha replied. Atha moved on down the line.

‘Ok, er, Sea Mist. Show me your reload. ...Good.’ Atha took her through the same steps and paced on, studying Deep Roots’ stance. ‘You’re taking to this, all of you,’ he told them. ‘I can’t train you in a few hours. But if I can teach you how to use a rifle properly, you might just stand a chance.’

‘Going up against trained Guardians,’ Aelu muttered, down at the end of the line. Shaking her head. ‘This is insane.’

‘Hasn’t stopped us so far,’ Big Fish grinned beside her. ‘And we kicked his ass, didn’t we?’ he said quietly, with a nod at Atha down the line. Aelu smiled a little, studying the scorched headshots on her distant target. ‘Anyway, you’re a good shot,’ said Big Fish. ‘And we’ve got the stronger motive. We want revenge. They’re just on the payroll.’

‘Earpieces,’ said the small comms officer, shuffling into the ship’s armoury with a box of them. ‘To work as a team, you need to communicate,’ he advised Tabitha, handing her an earpiece to put in. ‘If you see anything, make sure your team knows about it.’

‘So, you’re happy to help us commit major crime?’ Tabitha asked him curiously.

‘I follow my captain’s orders,’ he said simply, with a shrug. ‘I follow them more effectively when we’re doing the right thing.’

‘You think we’re doing the right thing?’

‘I was watching everything that happened on Stormworld,’ he replied, taking a hissing breath in his full-face mask. Bright lenses for eyes, staring up at her. ‘In time, I got some outside perspective. Your tribe’s point of view.’

‘And?’ said Tabitha.

‘A government that demands war crimes on free people, living in peace... shouldn’t be allowed to rule,’ he said. ‘But no one stops to question things, until it’s too late,’ he sighed. ‘Look. The Ministry still has some good people. I believe that,’ he said. ‘But it’s infected, too. Right at the top. No one’s going to fight that for us – you showed me that. So, I apologise. With every last shred of me, I’m sorry. If you want to stop these Ministers, I want to help.’

‘...Thanks,’ Tabitha replied, with a growing smile.

‘We’re coming up on the facility soon,’ he advised her. ‘You should get your team ready to drop. Good luck, Majesty.’

Majesty? Oh yeah. ‘Thanks,’ Tabitha replied, with a grim nod. Feeling the nerves twist and knot in her stomach.

‘Alright, earpieces in! Rifles strapped!’ Atha barked at them. ‘ETA fifteen minutes. Get down to that dropship in the hangar. And... whatever your black monster thing is,’ he said, glancing at Tabitha.

‘Remember,’ said Irren. ‘Get this right, and the whole galaxy will be watching what happens next.’

‘I’m not doing this for the galaxy,’ Tabitha replied, slinging her rifle. ‘Just my tribe.’

‘I’ll try to contact the facility as a Guardian ship, and request entry. But without clearance codes, we have to assume that’s not going to happen,’ Atha told them, as they followed him down the ship’s main corridor. Their combat suits clacked and rattled dully as they filed on behind him. ‘If it comes to it, I’ll give you air support with orbital bombing, to soften the defences. If you hear the warning in your earpieces, get the hell away from the blue dot.’

‘Blue dot?’ said Tabitha, walking beside him.

‘Big bright targeting circle on the ground, to aim the strike. You’ll see it,’ Atha replied.

‘Most of those defences should be AI and drone-based, via control towers. So take out what you have to,’ said Irren, as they came close to the hangar door.

‘It’s a military facility. How do you know that?’ said Atha.

‘It’s only staffed by military. The facility’s company-owned,’ Irren replied. ‘They figure no one’s dumb enough to attack these places. So, they keep costs down. That means minimal personnel. And all the automated defences they can get away with. It’s all guarded by robot artillery.’

‘What does that mean for us?’ said Tabitha.

‘Automated defences are easier for us to scramble from here,’ Atha replied. ‘We can jam their scanners, from orbit. For a time. It should give you chance to get past the big guns and missiles, aimed at the atmosphere.’

‘And not get blown up,’ Irren added.

‘Sounds promising,’ Aelu muttered sarcastically, as she followed them into the ship’s sprawling hangar. Shifting her slung rifle on her shoulder.

‘High risk, high reward,’ Irren reminded them. ‘Break out the Celestial, and we can hack the Ministry in seconds. We’ll stop their stranglehold, and spark a revolution. Overnight.’

‘If you say so,’ Big Fish sighed, doubtfully.

‘Hey. Are you sure you want to come with me?’ Tabitha asked her three retainers, as they broke off towards Seven where he waited. Barkless just watched her, and nodded like she didn’t need to ask.

‘Always,’ Deep Roots replied, rough-voiced; meeting her smile with his own.

‘Best, place. With you,’ said Sea Mist. ‘My, sister.’ Tabitha grabbed her shoulder, staring into her eyes. She took strength from that; Sea Mist’s unfailing loyalty. Maybe that was the essence of Fierce-Hope. They’d all come so far since she’d first met them. She’d failed miserably at protecting them from outside influences; here they were in full combat gear. Laser rifles slung at their backs. About to be thrown into a thoroughly modern fight... and ready for it.

‘Tabitha,’ said the Captain, walking over. ‘Look. I know this is rich, coming from me. But... just try to keep the casualties minimal. If you can. Those are Guardians down there, in that facility. They’re still our guys and girls.’

‘We’re not going to kill anyone, if we can help it,’ Tabitha replied. ‘You gave us these. We’ll use them,’ she said, nodding to the stun rounds and shock batons on their belts.

‘Despite the fact they’ll definitely try to kill us,’ said Aelu.

‘...I know,’ Atha sighed, guiltily. ‘Like I said, I’ll make contact first, and try to pass this off as Guardian business. I filed a false report back on Stormworld too, to give you an alibi over there. But still... they could already know who we are,’ he said. ‘To them, you’re still enemies of the state. Regardless... remember what I told you. Stick to cover, move as a team, work as a team. Get in and get out, fast. Let’s just pull a better Ministry out of all this.’

‘It’s bullshit,’ Big Fish snarled, as he followed Tabitha towards Seven. ‘We have to use stun shots down there, so no Guardians die? They had no problem using lethal rounds on your tribe. Or us.’

‘I’m trying really hard to look past it, believe me,’ Tabitha replied, bitterly. ‘But this can’t just be about revenge,’ she sighed. ‘If that’s all we’re fighting for... then we’re just the savages that the Ministry makes us out to be. If we don’t fight for something better than that... then all the lives we’ve lost won’t mean a thing.’

‘But there aren’t enough of us to be that moral,’ Big Fish countered, shaking his head. ‘Not against the Ministry. We need to do whatever it takes. We just don’t have that kind of–

‘We have to be better than these people,’ Tabitha interrupted him, quietly. Holding his stare. ‘We need to show them up for the murderers they are, and do it without stooping to their level. That’s how we get more people on our side. That’s how we win this.’ Big Fish was silent for a moment; he nodded as he came around to it.

‘Alright,’ he conceded, doubtfully. ‘You’re the boss. But I’m not making any promises, if... anything goes wrong.’

‘Me neither,’ she said, with a hopeless smile.

Tabitha climbed Seven’s scarred wing and took the saddle, as the living harness grew around her. Her thoughts plugged with his instantly, like hands in warm welcome gloves. His giant current; his hot-metal smell. Her nervous breaths, and the rising volts in her heartcore. She nudged him into a thumping walk through the hangar, and nodded to her Ghosts as they saw her off. A weary mismatched bunch, head to toe in enemy armour. Nothing in common but guns and guts. And the slightest hope that this might just work. Tabitha sank down through the hatch as she passed them by. Seven stomped on for the hangar’s light-wall opening, and the distant stars in the black. Jetscales booming as he shot away into the void, for the vast grey world beneath them.

‘Alright. We’re coming up on the atmosphere,’ Atha told the Ghosts, nodding them to the dropship ramp. ‘Good luck.’

59

Tabitha watched the grey desolate world crawling closer, spread out like a rotten map beneath them. Split snaking rivers and black-rock ravines, rolling endlessly below Seven’s sight.

‘Well, negotiations have failed,’ Atha said sarcastically, through Tabitha’s wristcom. Up above, the sky-hazy warship climbed away rapidly for orbit, as distant laserfire screeched and boomed on the hull. ‘I’ll start jamming their artillery now,’ said Atha. ‘You won’t have long.’

‘We’ll get through,’ Tabitha replied, as she saw the base and shot Seven down low. She checked the harness around her in the fleshy cockpit, and pulled the ribbed console closer in her seat. She’d left her combat armour behind, in favour of her catsuit; she couldn’t move in all that stuff.

‘Hey. This is all you now,’ she told Seven, as they raced low across the lunar desert. ‘I won’t hold you back.’ Seven barely replied to her thoughts, he was so focussed on the huge silent turrets in the distance. Narrowing all his rage on a single needling point.

‘They’re fucking jamming us!’ a Guardian gunner yelled at no one, smacking his consoles in the giant watchtower. The gun screens flickered with warped static; the remote artillery wouldn’t respond. It was that warship – their own warship. Scrambling their scanners. No idea what was coming for them.

Seven shot over the desert like Hell’s own cannonball. Ripping a dustcloud scar through the grey desert behind him, as he tore in low for the base.

‘Alright. The guns are coming back online,’ Atha warned Tabitha in the cockpit, through her wristcom. ‘In five, four, three...’

High above the watchtower, a dropship descended. The lone Guardian gunner smacked his screens furiously, and they finally came back to life.

‘Back online!’ he shouted out. ‘Dropship sighted!’ He studied the growing black dot in the sky from his bank of targeting screens, and aimed the remote artillery along the perimeter. His commanding officer stormed back into the control room.

‘No reply from the dropship! Open fire!’ the commander bellowed. Squeezing twin triggers, eyes fixed on his screens, the gunner unleashed a bright thumping barrage from the turrets outside. Booms echoed through the grey world. Drone artillery beeped back to life across the walls, and snapped around to join their own screeching shots at the sky.

The diving dropship banked and dodged a hail of whipping shots; closing the gap on the square facility sprawling below. It tilted and dodged again, engines roaring, as endless laser bolts machine-gunned up from the base.

‘We’re almost there! Hold on!’ Aelu called back to the Ghosts, from the co-pilot seat. ‘Tabitha, we need that artillery down now!’

‘Ten seconds,’ Tabitha replied in Seven’s cockpit. Tearing across the desert as she launched him towards the guns. She looked skywards as the dropship descended; all that fierce artillery fire closing in on it. Sudden bright shots blew the dropship apart in a thumping fireball.

‘Decoy’s gone,’ said Tabitha, watching the drone’s flaming wreckage bloom in the sky.

‘I see it. We’ll follow in low behind you,’ Aelu replied in her earpiece. Beside her, Atha’s pilot banked the second dropship to tail Seven up ahead of them. ‘Tabitha, we need to get through that artillery,’ Aelu told her earpiece. ‘Make a hole.’

‘Shit! Three o’clock!’ the Guardian commander yelled at his gunner. Staring through the tower windows in horror.

‘What!?’ said the gunner, distracted. His screens were being scrambled again.

‘Visual! Fucking three o’clock! Turn the guns!’ The commander screamed back. The panicked gunner yanked the controls to spin the giant turrets right. Too slow. Some great black monster shot for them from the desert; the windows blew deafening as it crashed through the wall beneath them like an earthquake. Seven punched himself through the tower in a blazing hole, toppling it to rubble behind him. Sirens wailed across the complex; a dropship swept in along the monster’s trail of destruction. Tabitha spun Seven in a twisting dive. She shot him in through turret after turret; a chain of explosions along the walls. Spat pale fire through the booming guns in their way. Seven wheeled and dived on shot-screeching cannons. Burning them to glowing metal wrecks as the Ghosts’ dropship thundered in behind.

‘Main complex is up ahead,’ said Tabitha, in Aelu’s earpiece. ‘Get ready.’

‘Got it,’ Aelu replied, watching sparse Guardians running for cover below. ‘Ready for this?’ she asked the rest in the back.

‘Hell yeah,’ said Big Fish, tapping Barkless on the shoulder beside him. He looked to Deep Roots as they readied their rifles, and nodded at Sea Mist to lower the ramp.

‘Ok, buddy?’ Big Fish asked Barkless, trying and failing at a fist bump. Barkless just grinned, and shook his big clenched hand. ‘Ah, we’ll work on it,’ Big Fish mumbled. The dropship rocked and tremored around them as the pilot dropped them down.

‘Ready!’ said Aelu, climbing out of her seat. ‘Go! Go!’ the Ghosts charged out; rifles raised and flashing shots as they rushed down the crashing ramp to the compound. Seven torched the barricades where he landed down ahead of them; burning a vast molten crescent through screeching gun turrets. The Ghosts sprinted for cover in his wake. The ground was soft grey moondust; the gravity slightly off. It made every running footstep just a little too light and effortless, like some strange floating dream.

‘Fighter drones, Tabitha,’ Big Fish warned her in his earpiece, watching growing dots flying in over the perimeter.

‘I’m on it,’ she replied in Seven’s cockpit, blasting a glowing hole through the compound’s armoured gates for them. Launching Seven into the sky.

‘Ah!’ Sea Mist snarled, rattling bright stun shots at the troops behind them. Running on behind the others for the facility. The sparse Guardians’ rifle bolts whipped and screeched past them, as the compound sirens shrieked on full alert.

‘Find some cover!’ Big Fish bellowed back at them, as he led the way. Machine-gunning the few Guardians inside the complex who fired on them from the walls. One of his stun shots found its mark, dropping a yelling soldier with a paralysing glow.

‘Shit!’ Aelu shouted breathlessly, diving behind a concrete barricade as a booming cannon bolt cratered the ground behind her.

‘I saw a blast! Is everyone alright!?’ said Tabitha, tearing Seven through the drones high above them.

‘We’re fine! But we’re getting pinned down in here!’ Aelu yelled back desperately.

‘Hold on, I’m coming!’ Tabitha replied. She threw herself into Seven’s mind, to rip and batter the mobbing drones to flaming scrap around them. An endless tailing swarm, clouding his dark shape in the sky. Clinging and cutting, one by one.

Down below in the compound, Deep Roots grabbed Aelu’s shoulder in wide-eyed terror, yelling gruff growling words at her.

‘What is it!?’ Aelu yelled back, distracted. Gunning down a Guardian as they came creeping around the compound to flank them. ‘What!?’ she snapped, looking where he was pointing. ‘...Shit!’

‘Tabitha, there’s a fucking tank down here!’ Aelu yelled in her earpiece. ‘Where the hell are you!?’

‘These drones are swarming me! There’s too many of them!’ came Tabitha’s broken reply. ‘Th – – all– ve – me! – I ca–

‘You’re breaking up!’ Aelu yelled desperately, watching the staring tank stomping closer. ‘We need you right now!’ Cold lenses glaring, the walking tank lined up its shot. The Ghosts ran in deafened dread as the giant wall exploded to rubble behind them. The whirring tank trained its turret on the metal containers where they raced for cover. Machine guns rattling shrill lasershots all around them as they ran terrified. Stomping ten-ton footprints across the compound, as it lined up its heat-hissing cannon for another shot.

‘Get away from the crates!’ Aelu screamed at the others. ‘Get back! Over the wall!’ she grabbed Deep Roots’ hand to help him over the rubble. Frantically trying to escape that staring brute. Big Fish turned in horror, as the tank drone stopped and aimed its shot. Its top gleamed bright blue. Doming light filled the sky, as a towering laserbeam dropped on the world. A god-hammer thunderbolt through the clouds. A deafening thoom obliterated the tank and everything around it in an earthquake blast, throwing the Ghosts way back over the ruined wall. The Guardians were running scared; falling back for better cover in the heart of the compound. A dark churning smokecloud loomed above them, raining stones and wreckage in a clattering hail.

‘...Fffuck,’ Big Fish groaned, his hearing all but gone, staggering to his feet in shock. He clutched his pounding head, watching the vast smoking crater in the compound. Nothing but hissing red rock where the tank drone had stood.

‘Got it,’ Captain Atha chuckled in their earpieces. ‘Everyone alright down there?’

‘Define alright,’ Aelu grumbled, blinking at the stars in her eyes. Checking that the others were ok.

‘Was that... First Ancestor?’ Sea Mist mumbled in Stormish. Staring dishevelled in shock, as Roots and Barkless helped her to her feet.

‘Orbitbom,’ Barkless explained happily, still grinning madly at the blast.

‘Did you see that, Tabitha?’ Aelu chuckled into her earpiece. Nothing but radio crackle. ‘Tabitha.’ The Ghosts watched one another for silent seconds. Last they’d heard, the drones were swarming her.

‘...She alright?’ said Big Fish. Aelu stared at him in concern. ‘Hey! Tabitha!’ he shouted into his earpiece. No Seven on the skyline; no reply.

‘Kha V’ha?’ said Deep Roots, walking over with Barkless and Sea Mist. ‘Ok?’ Nothing but silent glances. ‘...Ok?’ he said urgently, looking around at them, with wide worried eyes.

‘Don’t know, buddy,’ Big Fish said quietly. Sea Mist and Barkless stared at the giant in shocked silence.

‘...Well, we’re here now,’ Aelu said grimly, trying not to think about it. ‘So are they.’ She nodded at scrambling troops in the distance, hastily taking cover around barricades to the main door. ‘Come on,’ she told the others, all staring in grief. ‘Let’s finish this.’ Rifle shots and artillery screeched at them through the clearing smokecloud, forcing them into panicked cover.

‘I fucking hate drones,’ said Tabitha in their earpieces. The Ghosts looked at one another with sudden smiles. Sea Mist sighed in relief. ‘Cover your ears,’ Tabitha advised them.

‘What? Why?’ Aelu replied, searching the sky for her. Tabitha gripped Seven’s flight console and willed his jets to full throttle. She folded his wings back and pointed him at the base far below, in a sudden snarling dive.

‘What the hell are you doing!?’ Aelu yelled into her earpiece. No reply. They watched Seven drop from the clouds above them, straight down, like a bomb. No attempt to slow down. Artillery thundered laserfire into the sky. Tabitha blanked it all, clenching her jaw. Watching the compound rise up fast beneath them. In a sweeping split-second drop, Seven hit the central building in a deafening boom. Ploughed through concrete walls as the ruins toppled behind him into churning dust. He landed galloping in a black-smoke fireball, beating turrets to wreckage as he went. Spat melting white light through everything below him, as he swept off overhead.

‘You’re insane!’ Big Fish laughed in her earpiece, as Seven burst through giant barriers like a plane crash.

‘Go!’ Tabitha shouted back. ‘Get us inside!’ Big Fish growled and broke cover, leaving the rest to open fire behind him. He came hurtling at the shouting troops on the barricades like a body-armour wrecking ball. Laserfire whipped and crackled past him as he closed the gap. Up ahead, the Guardians took aim. The Ghosts’ covering fire forced them back down to hide.

‘Shit,’ Aelu muttered, watching Big Fish crumple the barricade recklessly down her rifle scope. He was thrashing and flailing, flattening Guardians and beating his way through smashed artillery to the main door. Aelu spied a soldier taking aim on him. She set her scope’s shaking crosshairs on him; breathed in a silent second. Squeezed the trigger and dropped him, paralysed.

Sea Mist and Barkless left Deep Roots exhausted in cover, and sprinted out across the compound. They opened fire on panicked Guardians in a flurry of laser shots, sharp teeth bared and snarling as they raced for the barricade. Shock batons out. Eyes wild. Tackled yelling Guardians to the ground and stunned them down. Tabitha leapt from Seven’s saddle and ran in past them for the main door beyond. Seven took off overhead to kill the rest of the drone artillery, spewing thick smoke over the compound as he went. Suddenly the air was shrouded in it. A blind coughing chaos of shots and shouting, to cover the Ghosts’ advance. Tabitha pulled on her breather helmet and immediately had the advantage; she ran and ducked from a choking figure in the fog. A bright rifle shot shrieked past her head as she charged in to grip the woman and shock her to the ground. Tabitha yelled at a glancing shot in the shoulder and spun with her rifle to shoot the soldier down. Sprinting on through a hail of blind laserbolts in the shouting smoke, to collide with another soldier. Snarling, she gripped his rifle and wrestled it aside as the tall man shot point-blank. She broke his nose with a punch; dropped him crackling with her volts. She ran for another as the coughing Guardian took aim on her; watched him thrown back suddenly in a puff of smoke by Aelu’s sniping shot. A clattering grenade forced Tabitha into cover behind hard containers. The deafening blast shook her cover; ringing in her ears as she staggered up and shot back at the figures in the smoke. A rifle stock smacked her hard in the head and dropped her. Before she could stagger up to claw him he was aiming a shot between her eyes. A roaring giant tackled him through the clearing smoke like a freight train, throwing him down and firing a stunning shot.

‘Come on!’ Big Fish bellowed, helping her up, as Sea Mist charged in past them. She shot a Guardian down and struck another stunned with her crackling baton, as Deep Roots’ cover fire whipped and rattled around her. Tabitha sprinted for the final barricade with Barkless shooting beside her. She took a running leap at the last yelling soldiers; gripped and dropped them in her volt-crackling hands. Deep Roots gunned down a straggler behind them; Sea Mist and Barkless swung their stun batons to ground him. Aelu’s sniping shots dropped a last distant Guardian before they could fire. Snarling, Big Fish looked around for the next fight. Nothing. The compound was quiet as the smoke drifted away.

‘Everyone alright?’ Tabitha said breathlessly. Hunched over by the door. Clutching a gushing wound right through her; a fierce scorching agony.

‘Are you?’ said Big Fish in shock, when he saw the smoking laser hole through her stomach. Streaming silver blood. They rushed in to catch her as she fell beside the wall.

‘Hhh. This really fucking hurts,’ she growled through her teeth; clutching her bloody stomach as they helped her sit down. Eyes watering at the pain. Sea Mist held her; Barkless and Deep Roots searched their belts frantically for any bandages.

‘I need to stop the bleeding,’ said Aelu, trying to clamp her hand on the wound. Tabitha shook her head, pushing her away.

‘It’ll heal,’ she said, shakily. ‘Seriously, it’s fine,’ she told everyone. ‘Let’s just get the door open.’

‘...Hand?’ said Big Fish, crouching beside her.

‘Yeah. I’ll take a hand,’ Tabitha replied, trying to smile. Breathing out, long and trembling, as the giant closed his huge fingers around hers. Watching the others while she healed, as they beat and battered at the door.

Nothing was working. Aelu shot the huge magnetic lock, over and over; the thick door just scorched and stood solid. Barkless and Deep Roots couldn’t prise or shock it open. Big Fish’s endless shoulder barges wouldn’t budge it. Seven landed down in the compound behind them, ready to melt it through.

‘Hm,’ said Tabitha, getting to her feet as her flesh knitted up. ‘See if this works,’ she muttered, springing her claws out. She sank them into the metal door, slowly; it was thick as hell. Creaking and crunching a tear in it, as the Ghosts watched silently. Sea Mist paused to stun a Guardian who wouldn’t stay down, and went back to staring intently. Teeth gritted, Tabitha growled and buried her claws in deeper. Snarling as she wrenched the giant lock away. She turned to the others, as the doors gave up and creaked apart.

‘Come on.’

Their footsteps squeaked and echoed down sleek shining corridors. Tabitha heard a shout up ahead, and motioned to them to hide. A pair of Guardians ran for cover down at the far end; opening fire. Aelu leapt for a crate and sprang up behind it, rattling shots back to cover their advance. Barkless and Sea Mist were snarling; trying to press on but pinned down in narrow alcoves. Laserbolts burst and sparked on the walls around them. There was a brief silence, as the Guardians reloaded; Big Fish charged up the corridor and ploughed straight through. He smashed the armoured troops into the walls with echoing crashes; gripping the one who tried to get back up.

‘Stay down,’ the giant growled at her. Pulling the rifle from her hands to bend it in half. Sea Mist walked over and stunned both soldiers with her shock batons, for good measure. Smiling as she did it.

‘You, er, enjoying yourself there?’ said Big Fish, curiously.

‘Good,’ Sea Mist replied, grinning her sharp smile. Lifting a volt-crackling baton approvingly.

‘Alright. Everyone grab those spare charge packs,’ Tabitha ordered them, looting the Guardians’ belts. ‘Take all the ammo you can find.’ One of the fallen Guardians grabbed her, and tried to knife her; she gripped and shocked him in a crackling fit until he fell limp. Pulling the combat knife from his hand to tuck it in her belt.

‘We need to move faster,’ said Aelu, peering around the doorway behind them, at the sound of running footsteps down the corridor. ‘I’ll hold them off. Go.’

‘Stay close,’ Tabitha replied, tossing her own stun rounds to her.

‘I will! Just go!’ said Aelu, arming her rifle. She turned and rattled shrieking shots at the distant troops down the corridor. Tabitha led the others sprinting up the next hallway to a locked door. She fried the control panel with her palm until the door gave up and swept open. Sea Mist was straight in, gunning down a running Guardian before they could open fire. Screeching shots rang and echoed in the stark clinical chamber. Big Fish and Deep Roots machine-gunned the walkway above them, dropping a Guardian and forcing the others back.

‘There, that door on the far side!’ said Tabitha, leading them cautiously into the chamber and sprinting for it. But the door wouldn’t budge; she slammed her palms on it in frustration. Trying desperately to shock the key panel, as the others shot the Guardians back. ‘Shit!’ she snapped, trying to claw into it. It was useless. Sea Mist dropped both Guardians with a hail of shots when they showed themselves. Snarling victoriously.

‘Ah, ah,’ Barkless cautioned Tabitha, pulling her away from the door. Looking behind him. Before Tabitha knew what was happening Big Fish came charging through the chamber, and tackled the door to a crumpled mess inside the next room. Sea Mist and Barkless were straight in, aiming their rifles around a dark empty lab. Tabitha checked on Aelu as she hurried along behind them, and followed Big Fish inside.

There it was. Haunting. Tabitha felt a frosty chill down her spine just to look at it. They stared up at a strange stone figure, deep in the cavernous lab; aglow like a statue in the dark. Vampire-dormant. Suspended in stasis like some crowned frozen deity, in a beam of pulsing light.

‘The Celestial,’ Tabitha muttered, watching in wonder. Its eerie glow lit her face. Barkless, Roots and Sea Mist stared in reverent silence. A divine machine.

‘That, is weird,’ said Big Fish. Wondering why the hell the Ministry would keep anything so locked, frozen and buried away, in a fortress on the far side of space. ‘You really think it’s as dangerous as Irren says?’

‘Let’s hope so,’ Tabitha replied, trying the control panel beside it. ‘Dangerous is good.’ She looked back at the sound of running footsteps. Aelu rushed in from the chamber outside.

‘Move faster!’ she said. ‘They’ll have reinforcements here any minute!’

‘It’s locked down!’ Tabitha called back helplessly, tapping frantically at the beeping console. Putting a palm on it; trying and failing to fry the circuits. Big Fish inspected the stasis beam carefully. He reached up, cautiously, and punched the ceiling to wreckage. The Ghosts just stared. He tore out every cable he could find and pulled them apart in a sparking frenzy, until the beam of light gave up and died. The stone figure collapsed and thumped heavily on the floor.

‘Or that way,’ Tabitha mumbled, as Big Fish looked back and smiled. They watched the Celestial’s fallen form as it came to life. Aiming their guns nervously as it slowly stood up; current coursing through its bright angular veins. Stone skin flushing smooth and glass-translucent. It stretched its sculpted body, and its clawed silvergold fingers; rolled its neck stiffly and studied them with a featureless mask of a face. Floating, a few inches off the floor. Divinely ornate; glowing from within. More masterpiece than machine. It said something none of them understood, in some fossil-futuristic vibration of a voice.

‘...We’re breaking you out,’ said Tabitha, nervously. Lowering her gun. The thing spoke quickly in that strange ancient language, beautiful but baffling. It reached out a hand to Tabitha’s wristcom, and downloaded every form of communication on the star net.

‘I believe that this is your most widely used language?’ it addressed them afresh. Rich-voiced; smooth and synthetic.

‘Yeah,’ Aelu replied, quietly. Staring like a god had descended. It definitely seemed celestial.

‘Have you... heard of the Ministry?’ Tabitha tried. The figure’s head snapped around to face her; unsettling in its glowing attention. ‘...Do you know anything about them?’ she said.

‘The Interworld Ministry,’ it mused, in that smooth-glass voice. ‘Yes. The name rouses... hate, in this one.’ Its strange warm glow flushed to cold, writhing black. ‘A great many atrocities were visited upon us. We few who lived on. This one is the last.’

‘How do you know?’ said Big Fish, staring in wonder. ‘Hey!’ he snapped at Aelu, as she dug him in the ribs to shut up.

‘There are... no other consciousnesses, in the collective,’ the Celestial replied, cryptically.

‘The collective?’ said Tabitha.

‘This one’s... society. A shared intelligence, beyond the reach of natural death,’ it said. ‘The highest accomplishment of a fallen race, who met their ruin before many stars were in their genesis. Of that surviving intelligence, only this one remains.’

‘...What happened?’ said Aelu. ‘Why are you the last one?’

‘The Interworld Ministry. Invasion,’ the Celestial replied, lost in thought. Running history through its mind. ‘Discovery,’ it said, with a haunted tone. ‘Demands; shallow and short-sighted. We refused. Then war, and destruction. Death. As the strongest, this one was detained. To be... utilised. They lack the technology to do so. And intend to keep this one here, until they do.’ Aelu watched it sadly.

‘You’re too advanced for them to do anything with you?’ said Tabitha.

‘For now,’ the Celestial replied. ‘But this one is... patient. As it has been for the lifespans of stars. But this Interworld Ministry... it must answer for these heinous acts,’ it said menacingly. Fists clenching as it rose to its full height. Ascending; its ornate wings unfurled.

‘That’s why we came here for you,’ said Tabitha. ‘Will you help us bring them down? The Ministry?’

‘They will be eradicated,’ it said wrathfully; its voice filling the chamber around them. ‘Their atrocities will not go unpunished. We will bring down this Ministry. And... dismantle, those responsible. Together.’ Sudden thumps and booms echoed above them.

‘That doesn’t sound good,’ Big Fish rumbled, watching the ceiling.

‘Reinforcements,’ said Aelu, listening to the distant drone of dropships touching down. Ushering them out of the lab. ‘They won’t let us leave here alive.’

‘Oh good,’ said Big Fish. Barkless, Roots and Sea Mist hurried on behind him.

‘And they’ve locked us in,’ Tabitha growled ahead of them, trying and failing to fry the panel by the door.

‘Allow me,’ said the Celestial. It placed an ornate hand on the console beside them, and brought it to life at will. The screen cycled countless reams of code in split-seconds and beeped agreeably, and the door unlocked and flew open. The Celestial floated through the doorway towards the distant heavy troops charging in.

‘Wait!’ Tabitha yelled desperately, running after it into the entrance chamber. With a sweep of its hand the Celestial stopped the running soldiers in their tracks. Suddenly they were frozen; trembling. Yelling in panic, encased in their robotic suits, as they slowly toppled like statues and hit the floor.

‘You hacked their armour!?’ said Aelu, lowering her rifle.

‘Their combat suits rely on software and connectivity to function,’ the Celestial replied, as he floated on through their fallen ranks.

‘So... you hacked a military network, to control them? Just like that?’ said Tabitha, leading the Ghosts on behind. They headed cautiously across the room of yelling frozen troops.

‘This one is a military network,’ the Celestial replied. ‘It is one of this one’s primary functions, to disable enemy software. Their platforms are primitive by comparison. Obsolete.’

‘So... you could hack the entire Ministry?’ said Aelu. ‘All the Guardians’ systems?’

‘This one has already accessed the Ministry’s public, private and military networks,’ the Celestial replied, leading them on down the corridor. ‘It seemed... prudent, to proliferate this one’s consciousness elsewhere on the star net.’

‘So you have access to banks? Government?’ said Tabitha, walking on beside him. ‘You could bankrupt the whole empire, just like that?’

‘This one could,’ the Celestial replied. ‘Though with this approach, this one calculates catastrophic socio-economic effects, for approximately ninety-four billion citizens.’

‘Yeah, maybe don’t do that,’ Big Fish rumbled, walking on behind them.

‘But you can still hack the complex here?’ said Tabitha. ‘You could switch off all the defences, so we can escape?’

‘This one already has,’ the Celestial replied.

60

Tabitha took a short shocked breath as they headed outside. The smoke-smelling compound was bristling with Guardians. A small army, lined up like one huge firing squad; assembled like statues around them. Countless armoured troops with their rifles aimed. Yelling and cursing uselessly in their hacked robotic suits. Every motor-assisted trigger finger, frozen solid. Dropships jet-droned as they hovered dormant above them; locked out to everyone but the Celestial. Suspended in time. Aiming soldiers shouted furiously in their useless armour, as the staring Ghosts walked by with their prize.

‘Well, this is...’ Big Fish mumbled.

‘Yes,’ Barkless agreed, staring at the scene.

‘Where’s Seven?’ said Aelu, watching the skies.

‘Around. Somewhere,’ Tabitha sighed, hopelessly. Probably burning a hill down or something. ‘...He does this a lot,’ she explained.

‘You have transportation?’ said the Celestial, turning to Tabitha.

‘There’s a warship, in orbit,’ she replied. ‘I’ll get them to send the dropship now,’ she said, raising her wristcom.

‘This one will acquire another,’ said the Celestial. It cast a hand at one of the frozen dropships, taking control, and tilted its hovering jets. Angling it backwards. Tipping the yelling armoured soldiers down its open ramp, to smack down on the concrete one by one.

‘They are unharmed,’ the Celestial assured them. Checking the soldiers’ vitals in their hacked software, as he summoned the dropship over.

‘Yeah, we need to work on that,’ Big Fish rumbled. Rattling one of the shouting Guardians in their frozen suit. ‘I just want to... pop him. Like a can.’

‘No! Please!’ came his muffled reply inside the staring helmet. Begging for mercy.

‘Leave him alone,’ Tabitha replied absently, as she motioned Sea Mist and Barkless towards the landing dropship. She whistled loudly at the blue sky and the grey desert for Seven to come and find them. The dropship’s panicked pilot leapt down suddenly from the open door, wailing in terror, and ran for her life across the compound. The Ghosts watched Barkless step forward. He cracked his neck, sniffed, and aimed his rifle on the running figure in the distance. Waiting. Staring intently down the gun sights, with a hunter’s patience. He dropped the shrinking figure with a longshot; she finally stopped shrieking and fell down stunned. Sea Mist tried to hide a smile, as Barkless slung his rifle and walked past her for the dropship ramp. Grinning to himself.

‘Yes!’ Big Fish laughed. Tickled by it. Staggering past Tabitha in growing hysterics, as he headed inside the dropship. ‘Ahh, that made my life!’ he whimpered happily, disappearing inside.

‘Alright. I can fly this,’ said Aelu, climbing into the pilot seat. ‘I think,’ she muttered to herself. ‘Hey Atha, can you hear me?’ she said into her earpiece, as she fastened the seat harness around her.

‘Yeah, I hear you,’ his crackling voice replied from orbit. ‘Everything on board’s completely locked out. What the hell’s going on down there? It looks like a standoff.’

‘It’s the guy we came for. He’s hacked the whole network,’ Tabitha replied into her earpiece. ‘He’s frozen everything. Power suits too.’

‘Well, at least no one’s dying,’ Atha reasoned.

‘We’ll explain when we get back,’ said Tabitha. ‘Alright. Everyone in,’ she told the Ghosts happily, waving Sea Mist onto the dropship. ‘Roots, you can come with me if you like,’ she told him. He nodded gladly. He much preferred Seven to the dropships. The bird spirit felt a bit more natural, at least.

‘This one will leave last,’ said the Celestial. ‘To ensure full network control, and your safe escape.’

‘Good point,’ Tabitha replied, as the Ghosts strapped into the dropship and the ramp closed. ‘Alright. Go back with me, in Seven. If we’ll all fit. And if he ever actually comes back,’ she muttered. Whistling at the desert again. ‘Ok, get going,’ she said into her earpiece, watching Aelu through the cockpit canopy. ‘We’ll see you back on the ship. We’ll need to move fast now.’

‘Ok. Be quick,’ Aelu warned her. Glancing at the yelling frozen army around them, as if all their suits would suddenly come back to life.

‘Go,’ Tabitha insisted. They watched the dropship lift away, tearing off into the sky for the Defiance up in orbit. A bright satellite speck high above them, way up in the blue. Tabitha glanced at Deep Roots; he watched the grey desert keenly for the bird spirit’s return. He’d never tell her that he was tired of all this; he was too loyal for that. But she saw it, in his pale eyes. He was exhausted. It was tough, to keep up with Barkless and Sea Mist. And things were only getting stranger. He should’ve been sitting warm by the Hearthfire, teaching the cubs their painted words. Telling them ancient tales in the night, of Fierce-Hope and First Ancestor. The fire-eyes and the stone singers; the Mist King and the Winter’s War. All the cubs’ tiny fireglow silhouettes, listening in rapt attention, by the woodsmoke and the crackling flames.

‘Hey,’ she said, quietly. ‘...Let’s go home. To Sacred Mountain.’ She’d never seen him smile so widely.

‘Good,’ Deep Roots replied, beaming. Patting his palm on his heart. Tabitha smiled with him, and just wished she could go back to Havenhall too. But the Ghosts’ biggest fight was still to come. This was the start of a revolution; Serenity was about to throw everything at them. She looked at the Celestial; a strange ancient thing. Their chance to fight back, together, and hack the Ministry itself. And finally bring those Ministers down, for everything they’d done.

‘Your transport?’ said the Celestial, watching a growing dot over the bleak grey desert.

‘...Yeah,’ Tabitha replied happily, as Seven’s black shape raced towards them. ‘You took your time!’ she called to him, as he swept down across the base. Suddenly he snarled painfully and dropped like a rock, and smashed through a building in the distance.

‘Seven!?’ Tabitha yelled in horror, running for the dustcloud.

‘There you are!’ someone said happily, away behind them. American English; too familiar. A freezing shard of glass through her soul. Jagged scalding shock when she turned around, staring. Deep Roots and the Celestial floated in silent paralysis; pinned and electrified. A smiling figure walked between them.

‘I thought I’d never see you again,’ Alex said warmly, coming closer. Strange flaring pinpricks lit his wild eyes. Tabitha froze in fear; backing away. Up behind him a colossal black shape crept through the distant sky, cloaked in vast stormclouds; the Watchers’ ship. Snuffing out every light on the base. The Celestial lost its control. The hacked hovering dropships all around them lost power, and fell on their own frozen troops; a dozen screaming fireballs in the compound. The surviving Guardians around them were pulling triggers on dead rifles; every circuit fried. Terror-struck and staggering away from the scene in dead armour. Smiling, Alex spread his arms and burst voltage. He slammed Deep Roots and the Celestial into the ground, crackling and unconscious. Grinning that sharp black smile from her nightmares. Tabitha screamed and ran at him in a rage. He moved too fast; turning and sidestepping. Floating backwards as she attacked him, inches off the ground. Laughing at her misses and darting aside. Her swiping claws screeched and clattered on his dark scaled chest as he blocked her strikes; she gripped his wrist and shocked him. He only absorbed the current, and shot her at the ground with a lightning bolt; a wrecking ball in the chest. The bright bang echoed across the compound. He lashed out laughing as Tabitha rolled away and scrambled to her feet, running for Seven in the ruins. Alex whipped his sharp tail around her legs and tripped her with a concrete smack. Bloody-nosed, Tabitha kicked herself away frantically. He burst the ground at her feet with a snarling punch and a blinding bang. Another as she staggered away; beating a trail of sparking craters in her wake. He was reaching for her, pouncing for her; laughing as she stumbled and tail-stabbing the ground around her. He caught her punch in his sparking hand and launched her at the concrete, with an ear-ringing neckjolt slap. Before Tabitha could crawl away dazed he gripped her leg and burned her bones. Tossed her down like a doll and skewered his tail through her back, in an echoing bloodspurt scream. He threw her down and pinned her hard. His teeth ripped at her neck; a sudden fierce agony. She screamed in panic and struggled against impossible strength as he tore another mouthful of her; laughing in her face with a spray of silver blood. Eating her alive. When the Celestial staggered up and came crashing into him Alex roared and gripped it. Punched an iron-black fist clean through its chest in a glass-burst crack. Tossed it down laughing and laid into it brutally like a fallen punchbag. When Tabitha ran for him he turned and smiled; his hand shot out. A sudden wall of burning white light; she flew back and smashed into the ground. Tabitha shook her pounding head and staggered to her feet, still crackling and burning from the shock. She watched in a slow-motion daze as Deep Roots went running at Alex in the distance.

‘No!’ she screamed desperately, as the old man flew back in a thunderbolt bang. She saw Alex smiling at her in the twisting smoke. Opening his palm to her. A flash of light and she flew back in another scorching burst. Dazed, catsuit smoking as she staggered up, Tabitha clutched her mauled bloody neck and searched desperately for him in the smoke. Everything was a dark foggy chaos around her. She didn’t see his whipping-tail silhouette walking up on her from behind. Staring demonic. Pulling the long black blade from his belt. He’d come to take her head; finish her once and for all. Just like the Watchers had told him. When Tabitha heard his breath and spun around he swung the blade at her neck. A brown blur shoved her aside; a sickening bloodspurt thump. Tabitha screamed at the sight. Alex grinned and pulled the blade from Deep Roots, slick with red blood. The old man breathed a trembling sigh, and fell to his knees. Clutched his gushing wound and stared at the demon defiantly, and staggered back up in Fierce-Hope. When Tabitha moved past him desperately for Alex, Deep Roots shoved her back with growling words. Alex floored her again with a bolt of light; a firework scream and a bang that broke ribs. The old man pulled his glass knife and bellowed at him; the demon grinned and struck again. Deep Roots couldn’t fend off the swings; he took the demon’s blade hard in his stomach and buried his old glass knife in its neck. Alex gasped and choked on it before the snarling creature pulled it out. He sent a burning shock through the old man that threw him down hard at Tabitha’s side. Before she could push herself up, half-paralysed, Deep Roots was already struggling to his feet. Alex was walking over.

‘Get away! Roots, get away from him!’ Tabitha cried out, terrified. But the old man just looked at her. His brave strong daughter, Dark Storm. Smiling that creased old grin. Tightening his leathery hand around his knife.

‘For my Queen,’ he told her, dribbling blood.

‘No!’ Tabitha screamed desperately, reaching out for him as he ran at Alex. She felt Deep Roots’ warcry rumble in her chest. Watched him bury his knife in Alex’s sparking heart, with every fierce final drop of strength he had in him. Alex laughed and floored him with a roaring shock. He lifted the old man by his throat and electrocuted him, in a crackling cloud of smoking fur. Dropped him dead. Tabitha screamed wildly and ran at him. She laid into Alex’s grinning face in a raging volley of bonebreak cracks. Floored him in the dirt with a heartbroken yell. Pounced on him and pummelled his laughing face to a bloody broken mess that just kept healing. Screaming savagely, she buried her knife in his heart and tried frantically to claw him to shreds. A sudden bursting light threw her back, stunned and smoking on the ground. Alex got up, laughing and wiping the blood; he turned and lifted the Celestial’s limp shape by the neck. Dragging it over like a prize, he picked up the black blade. He walked closer with that sharp night grin, and pounced. Stunned her and clawed her apart screaming, and raised the blade to take her head. A thundering white fireball blew him away; crackling flesh flying. Screaming in pain, Alex picked himself up shakily in a pool of flesh and blood. Half-demolished. Yelling in a gory rage as he healed. Up above he saw Seven hurtling towards him. Alex launched a lightning storm at the sky; he couldn’t hurt the thing.

‘Thanks for the healing,’ he told Tabitha, grinning insane. He rose up, the Celestial dangling in his grasp, and shot away for the Watcher ship as Seven crashed down where he’d stood. Seven roared rabid at his shrinking shape, and took off to chase him down.

Tabitha lay mangled and silver in a sparking dustcloud, screaming in gored-open agony. She couldn’t move. Time crawled to an eternity, as her flesh and bones knitted together. She watched the monstrous mothership crawling overhead; the great destroyer. Its shrieking artillery, forcing Seven away. Dark writhing specks tumbling endlessly from its sides, crashing down in the lunar desert. Tabitha crawled over torturously to Deep Roots’ body, trailing blood; her eyes hot with tears. Crying bitterly. She laid a silver-bloodied hand gently on his beaten old face; proud even in death. She was sobbing; utterly heartbroken. In a few terrifying minutes she’d lost them both; Deep Roots and the Celestial. Her best friend, and their best hope. She picked up a small shattered fragment of the Celestial from the whispering grey dirt. She held it hopelessly in her fist, that she couldn’t keep from trembling.

Our only chance to hit back at the Ministry. Gone. Tabitha fell back with a searing scream as a laserbolt cut through her shoulder. Watcher troops opened fire from the perimeter, running for her. Silver spiders swarmed the compound. Hulking black brutes came pounding across the concrete, racing to rip her apart. She yelled and struggled as Seven landed and lifted her away. Wrestling against his huge gentle claws. Screaming to fight the Watchers down there in the grey lunar dust, as her blood rained down in endless silver drops. Seven raced for the high dark blue beyond the clouds. The black ship’s artillery boomed around him as he left the base far below; the swarming monsters were already tearing it down. Tabitha’s catsuit fleshed into a spacesuit around her, as Seven shot for the stars.

61

Seven landed in the warship’s hangar with a skidding bang. Tabitha was numb; senseless. She peeled back her catsuit helmet and just sat on the floor beside him, staring silently at the far wall of the docking bay. The Ghosts came running in around her. Yelling and screaming at the ship’s running medic to see to her; asking over and over what’d happened. Tabitha clutched her mangled healing body, pink-eyed with tears. Lost to the world. The alien medic worked fast with gel dressings and anaesthetic.

‘What the hell were those stormclouds down there!?’ Atha demanded. ‘It’s killed every scanner on the ship! All our weapons are down!’

‘Tabitha. What happened?’ said Aelu, desperately, for the fifth time.

‘Roots...’ she mumbled. ‘The Celestial... they’re dead.’

‘What!?’ Aelu screamed. ‘How!?’

‘They were waiting for us,’ Tabitha sobbed. ‘The race that killed my planet... the man who tried to kill me... they found us. Deep Roots protected me. He died fighting for me.’ She heard Sea Mist wail, and fall to her knees in heartbreak; she seemed in a far distant place.

‘No,’ Big Fish growled. His skin flushed to angry black stripes, as he clamped his hands to his head. He smashed a dent in the metal wall, sudden and thundering. ‘No!’ Tabitha sat in stunned silence and wondered how many more people had to die because of her. She couldn’t take this any more. Aelu just sat and held her. Barkless was shouting to her, right up in her face; everything was muffled and distant. She couldn’t hear him until he grabbed her shoulders.

‘Strong!’ he yelled at her, tugging at her arm. ‘Must fight! Deep Roots dies, for you! Be strong!’

‘How!? How am I supposed to be strong!?’ Tabitha screamed furiously, pulling her arm from his grip. ‘We’ve already lost! What is there to be strong for!?’ Sea Mist glared angrily; she stormed over and smacked her in the face. Tabitha watched her in stunned silence.

‘My father’s father, dies for you!’ Sea Mist screamed at her, tears streaming. Her young voice trembling with grief and fury. ‘You, will not, mourn!’ she snarled. ‘You, will not, shame his sacrifice!’ she yelled. ‘Be, strong!’

‘Give her a break!’ Aelu yelled defensively.

‘Ancient Way!’ Barkless snapped at her. ‘You are Fierce-Hope! We live, for you! We die, for you! Fight!’ Tabitha watched them silently. They were heartbroken... but it hadn’t broken them. It only made them more certain. More of what they were already. Warriors.

‘If you, are queen, then be queen now!’ said Sea Mist, sad and fierce. ‘If you fight, then fight now!’

‘...You’re right,’ Tabitha said quietly, meeting her stare. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t sorry,’ Sea Mist growled at her, spitting on the floor at such weakness. ‘Never, sorry,’ she snapped. ‘Honour him. Be Sky Queen. Strong. Be Ancient Way.’ Tabitha watched them all in the silence.

It should be you leading us, she thought, as she watched Sea Mist’s fury and conviction. The living embodiment of Fierce-Hope, no matter what. I don’t deserve to lead the Ghosts.

‘...I need a drink,’ she told them quietly. Leaving them there. Limping out in cold numb guilt.

‘I can help you there, at least,’ Captain Atha replied. ‘Come on.’

‘I know how you’re feeling. Believe me,’ said Atha, once they were alone in the ship’s cavernous cargo hold. ‘I also know there’s nothing I can say, and all you want to do right now is not feel it so damn much.’ He put a bottle of spirit in her metal hand with a clink; both sitting down together in the dim hold.

‘They need you. More than you know,’ he said. Tabitha nodded, sitting back silently against a giant crate. She took a smooth burning gulp of whatever spirit was in that bottle. She just wanted to sit here and finish the lot, and get out of her thoughts completely.

‘He trusted me,’ she said, taking another burning gulp. ‘He followed me to that place, and I failed him.’

‘He wanted to fight with you,’ Atha replied. ‘He died for you. The only way you’ll fail him is if you stop fighting now,’ he said. ‘Then, he would have died in vain. And all those other lives, on my side and yours... they won’t mean a damn thing if we can’t bring the Ministers down now. You have to keep fighting.’ Tabitha stared at the far wall in silence, shaking her head. Thinking over everyone who’d ever died fighting with her.

‘Alright,’ said Atha, taking the bottle from her. Gulping some himself. ‘Now you’ve drowned your sorrows. Get up.’

‘You can’t be serious,’ said Tabitha, disbelieving. ‘I’m not like you. I can’t just–

‘You think you’re the only one who’s ever lost a friend!?’ Atha snapped, angrily. ‘Or have a mission go to shit!? No. Self-pity’s a luxury we don’t have time for,’ he snarled at her. She watched him silently. ‘Fucking stand up,’ he growled at her. ‘Finish what you started. What your friend just fought and died for. Go and lead your team.’

Tabitha came back to the others with Atha beside her. Sea Mist watched her and smiled, sadly; she came over and hugged her sister tight. They were watching her; waiting for leadership. Losing Roots could tear them apart now... or forge them together, stronger than before.

‘We can’t change what happened,’ she told her Ghosts. ‘All we can do is keep fighting. And make sure Roots didn’t die for nothing.’

‘Strong,’ Barkless told her, gripping her shoulder. Staring into her eyes with a sad smile.

‘So... what’s the plan?’ Aelu sighed. Still pink-eyed with tears herself.

‘With no Celestial? Not hacking the Ministry, apparently,’ Irren muttered, as he wandered over.

‘...We set out to save those worlds from the Ministry,’ Tabitha replied. Staring at the small dead fragment of the Celestial, still clutched in her hand. ‘Now we need to save them from something much worse.’

‘Those things that took your planet?’ said Aelu.

‘The Watchers,’ Tabitha replied, with a grim nod. ‘They’re far more dangerous than any Ministers. More than anything you’ve ever seen.’

‘What do they want?’ said Big Fish. ‘Territory?’

‘Your worlds. Your lives,’ Tabitha replied. ‘All one hundred billion of them.’

‘What?’ Aelu muttered, terrified, as it sank in. ‘...Look, there’s a handful of us,’ she said. Ready, but realistic. ‘What can we do about it?’

‘Warn them,’ Tabitha replied. ‘Maybe that’s all we can do. We have to try.’

‘Well, we’re with you,’ said Big Fish, looking at the others. ‘Whatever happens,’ he sighed. ‘Lead the way.’ Tabitha glanced around proudly at her mismatched team. Her fearless fighting Ghosts.

‘Captain. I need to make a call,’ she told Atha, where he leant grimly by the doors.

‘...Yes ma’am,’ he replied.

‘You’re sure about this?’ said Atha on the ship’s bridge, as the stars wheeled by beyond the canopy.

‘They have to know what’s coming for them,’ Tabitha replied. ‘I need to go to the top.’

‘...Alright,’ he sighed, doubtfully. ‘I’m putting in the call now. Good luck.’ Tabitha heard him tapping away at a console beside her. The metal-plastic smell of the ship’s bridge filled her head; her senses had never felt sharper. Heartcore, racing. She was rubbing her fingertips nervously against her hard black palms, with whispering metal grinds. Still holding that dead shard of the Celestial, for some reason. Maybe it reminded her why she was still fighting. A huge hologram screen flickered into existence ahead of her, on the front canopy. A pale androgynous face faded into view.

‘First Minister,’ said Tabitha, coldly.

‘Your Majesty,’ the winter figure replied, in pleasant surprise. Smiling menacingly. ‘We’ve been looking for you everywhere,’ it chuckled. ‘You appear to have one of our ships. Hand yourself in, and we may even let you live,’ it purred.

‘First Minister, there’s something coming for us that’s bigger than anything between us. Or our worlds,’ Tabitha said urgently. ‘I think it’s coming straight for Serenity. We have to stop it, before it reaches your people.’

‘Hm? And what’s that?’ the winter figure smirked, deigning to entertain her.

‘A black ship,’ Tabitha replied. ‘I warned you about them, and you didn’t take me seriously. Now they’re here. They’re coming for your worlds.’

‘Ahh, yes. These Watchers you told me about,’ the Minister replied. ‘Oh, I know they’re coming,’ it said, matter-of-factly. ‘I invited them.’

‘What!?’ said Tabitha, horrified.

‘Well. They sounded so impressive, from what you told us,’ the winter figure smirked. ‘We wanted to meet this fabled race. And see if we can’t expand our territories more effectively together. As one ambitious union.’

‘They took over my world! They wiped out my race!’ Tabitha screamed, aghast.

‘Well, conquerors do tend to employ some rather extreme methods,’ the winter figure conceded. ‘Although in fairness, you do tend towards a flair for the dramatic, Majesty,’ it said playfully. ‘But the thing with conquerors is... if you can give them what they want more easily, then they aren’t conquerors for very long,’ it explained. ‘And we’re particularly good at giving people what they want.’

‘Listen to me!’ Tabitha raged. ‘They don’t care about money, or trade deals! They just take everything! They’ll kill you all!’ ...Deep Roots is dead because of you, you smirking fuck.

‘If it’s war they want, it’s war they’ll get,’ the winter figure purred. ‘With several world fleets to their one ship... I think we may have the advantage.’

‘They’ll shut down every warship you throw at them!’ Tabitha screamed back, as Atha’s crew and the Ghosts watched in silence. ‘All your technology’s going to be useless!’ she yelled. ‘They’ll switch off everything, and wipe out every one of you! Billions of people are going to die! You have to believe me! You have to get everyone away, until we can work out how to fight them!’

‘...Well, let’s see what becomes of negotiations first, shall we?’ the winter figure replied calmly. Condescending. ‘Honestly, Majesty. If your amateur career in politics doesn’t work out, then I really think there’s a place for you in the theatre,’ the pale figure chuckled. ‘If we ever decide to let you leave your prison cell, of course.’

‘Fucking listen to me! They’re going to wipe you out!’ Tabitha screamed desperately.

‘You must excuse me, Majesty. I’ll need to prepare, to meet with your ambitious friends,’ the winter figure replied, dismissively. ‘And please, bring our starship back? They’re very expensive. Goodbye, Majesty.’ With that, the screen went black. Tabitha yelled furiously with gritted teeth.

‘Try the rest of the council!’ she told Atha desperately. ‘Or your generals! Anyone!’

‘The Ministry’s blocked our transmissions, Captain,’ said the comms officer.

‘Shit,’ Atha sighed. ‘Well, all we can do now is get back there, and help to evacuate,’ he said hopelessly. ‘Take us back to Serenity. Full speed.’

‘Yes Captain,’ the pilot replied, tapping quickly at his console.

‘Hey. You tried,’ Aelu told Tabitha grimly, coming to stand with her. ‘I know, that’s no consolation.’

‘It wouldn’t matter if they did believe me,’ Tabitha said despairingly, as they joined the Ghosts at the back of the bridge. ‘They’ll never evacuate in time.’

‘But we’ll fight them anyway,’ said Big Fish, defiant. ‘Even if we only save a few people, that’s got to be better than nothing. It might even lead other worlds to fight back. We have to try.’

‘No one gets it,’ Tabitha replied, despondently. ‘All the Ministry’s weapons and warships, and technology... it won’t mean a thing when the Watchers come. They’ll just switch it all off.’ The others were staring silently. ‘There won’t be a war... just genocide,’ she said. ‘A hundred billion people, dying in the dark.’

‘So they just... shut it all down?’ said Atha, walking over. ‘Everything?’ Facing up to the idea, of having no tech whatsoever to fight with.

‘Anything with a chip or a current,’ Tabitha replied. ‘No lasers, no lights. Homes, hospitals, farms...’

‘Shit,’ Atha mumbled.

‘Yeah,’ Tabitha agreed. ‘I mean... do you even have old guns? That fire bullets?’

‘Centuries ago,’ said Aelu, hopelessly. ‘Maybe a few hundred left, in museums. They’re relics. No one makes hard ammunition any more.’ Tabitha looked around at them. They really were screwed.

‘Still can fight war,’ Barkless shrugged, breaking the heavy silence. ‘No, lasers. No, lights.’

‘Just knife. And, arrows,’ Sea Mist agreed. ‘Just, Fierce-Hope.’ Tabitha stared at them in revelation.

‘Change course,’ she told Atha urgently. ‘We’re going back to Stormworld.’

‘I thought we had to get to Serenity?’ Atha argued. ‘What’s on Stormworld?’

‘...My army,’ she said. Tabitha’s heartcore raced at the thought, humming silently with rising current. Maybe they still had a chance. Suddenly the shard of the Celestial trembled in her fist. Drinking volts from her palm. Tabitha opened her fingers, and watched it in shock. Its tiny circuit-veins, glowing.

62

A gleaming presidential starship roared out into deeper space, engines glowing blue in the starry black. Heading on towards a vast crawling shape, distant and impossibly dark; visible only where it blocked out the stars. The Watchers’ ship. Blockaded politely, at a great distance, by vast fleets of Guardian warships. Many of them were armed with the most fearsome new weapons ever devised; aimed and ready to reduce the Watchers to clouds of bright atoms and gaping black holes.

Inside the presidential ship, surrounded by private-class comforts, the wintry First Minister practised its sales pitch again. Running through every detail, endlessly. Every blunt-object factoid and armour-piercing statistic; every infinite facet and miniscule connection. The Watchers had to agree to Ministry membership; their technology was far too valuable. The Minister couldn’t fuck up today, under any circumstances. All its life, it’d been working for a chance like this. It lived for the deal. This was The Big One.

They were closing in on the ship now. The First Minister rapidly rehearsed its nimble-footwork thoughts, for every possible gap and hesitation; every counterpoint uppercut and haymaker close. An entire mental galaxy of socio-economic political thoughts and concepts, paired with that good-old, can’t-fail, I’m just here to serve. It had responses memorised for a vast array of potential problems, hypotheticals and corresponding value-proposition solutions. Endless armories of cost-benefit analysis and weapons-grade philosophical sales ammunition, right down to the existential. The First Minister turned everything around in its head, for the hundredth time, until its case was flawless. Even if it came to it, the Watchers could just have a world or three. Some of those planets were dead weight anyway; it was a small price to pay for the Watchers’ technology.

Every good investment needs a little blood on the altar. Ever since its street-shivering childhood, the winter figure had learned it hard and well: the only sin was a bad deal.

‘First Minister. Are you absolutely certain this is the wisest course of action?’ said a nervous delegate beside it.

‘The Watchers invited us to negotiate,’ the Minister replied, fearlessly. ‘Look. I make deals. For powerful new friends, I can make very generous deals. Everyone wants something.’ The delegate bowed his head obediently.

Usually power, in one currency or another. And they can have it. But first, they’ll learn to share.

Once the starship docked with the Watchers’ dark monstrosity, the First Minister descended the ramp into a fleshy white hangar. An armed entourage filed out behind it, their weapons undetectable and concealed in fine robes, with more devastating artillery hidden through the ship. All of it shielded and hardened against any kind of shock or shutdown, just in case negotiations went south. If all else failed, the ship’s reactor was rigged to provide a considerable insurance policy.

A door melted open across the hangar. A tall dark figure strode across the bright space towards them.

‘I am honoured to meet with you,’ said the First Minister respectfully, offering to shake its hand. The Watcher, statue-masked and fully armoured, was slender and slightly taller. It stood with monstrous escorts to receive them, in total silence. Indifferent to pleasantry.

‘Ha,’ the winter figure said quietly; politely. Withdrawing its lonely unshaken hand in the heavy silence. ‘Straight to business then,’ it said pleasantly. ‘I like that. Do we have a room where we can discuss things further, or...?’ The Watcher gave it nothing but stony silence.

‘Or here’s fine,’ the First Minister chuckled. ‘Clearly you’re very busy, so I won’t waste your time. First and foremost, let me tell you that the Ministry’s federated worlds are eager to welcome all newcomers, with open arms,’ it continued warmly. ‘I can’t begin to tell you how long we’ve waited, for such a tremendous opportunity as this.’ It waited for the Watcher’s reply in the staring silence.

...Well say something, you ignorant bastard.

‘I thought as a simple preliminary discussion, we could cover the basic practicalities of potential partnership,’ the First Minister tried, with total confidence. ‘Expectations, expansion strategy; cultural cohesion and integration; trade, council membership, that sort of thing,’ it continued casually, as if they were petty details. Nothing but cold silence in return.

I see. Language barrier. Cultural differences. May have to be a little more on the nose. ‘We could even just discuss straightforward arms deals, and with plenty of demand, if that’s more to your satisfaction?’ the Minister tried, with a winning smile. ‘Allow me to say that you’ve refined your military weaponry to the point of living art,’ it added pleasantly, looking around at the winged hardware in the hangar. Trying to appeal to the Watcher’s sensibilities; clearly a warrior race. ‘You would of course take a prominent position on our council of worlds, if you so chose,’ the First Minister tried. ‘You’d have direct influence on military strategy, and our use of biohardware... plus considerable development budgets, to refine your technology further. Dare I say, even a monopoly on top-level arms contracts?’ it continued, trying to tempt it. ‘Just imagine. What could you achieve for your entire civilisation, with that kind of unlimited wealth? How far could you extend your reach and influence into the universe?’ Still no reaction. The First Minister hesitated in the heavy silence. ‘You’ve... studied the language packs we sent, I assume? Or maybe not? Do we have a solution for the communications barrier, or...?’ the dark masked figure just studied the First Minister talking; menacing in its silence. The Minister grew increasingly unsettled at their frosty reception. Hostile, even. It began to wonder if these newcomers’ market expectations were a little more... absolute. The monstrous brutes guarding the Watcher filled the silence with heaving breaths; cold eyes staring and fiery lights in their throats.

‘Perhaps we could... continue talks, at a later date,’ the First Minister said pleasantly. No response. ‘My apologies. I’d assumed your request to negotiate would involve some negotiation,’ it joked. ‘We’ll... take our leave, then.’ The Minister and its entourage turned suddenly at a sharp grinding crunch. Up on their ship, some hulking black monster chewed a molten panel from its shining hull. A strange sensation through the hangar caused their gleaming starship to die completely, from front lights to rear reactor.

‘We will not suffer this aggression!’ the First Minister snarled indignantly, turning back to the Watcher. ‘Our war fleets will meet any further acts of–

The Watcher threw a gauntlet punch that dropped the Minister screaming with a broken jaw. Its frantic bodyguards pulled triggers on indestructible weapons that still wouldn’t fire. Yelling in panic, as strange silver spiders surrounded and pinned them. They watched in horror as the tall dark figure beat the First Minister bloody, and dropped it to the floor. The spiders swarmed. The Watcher walked away, and left them to their screaming deaths. The last thing the dying dignitaries saw was a yellow-haired ape, grinning a sharp black smile as it walked over.

‘I want that one to myself,’ Alex told the Watcher, as they passed each other in the sinewy hangar. The Watcher walked out furiously, ignoring him.

Beaten half to death, sprawled on the floor, the androgynous First Minister watched the ape species stalking closer. Not unlike the Sky Queen. Alex reached a hand out and stunned the yelling Minister with crackling volts. He watched it jerking and fitting, and smiled. It croaked quietly when he stopped. Clothes smoking. Muttering for mercy.

‘Hi,’ Alex said happily, looking it deep in the eyes. Taking a deep delicious sniff of its burned wintry skin, with a smiling sigh. ‘So. How were the talks?’ he said brightly, in words the Minister couldn’t understand. ‘You can’t negotiate with these things,’ he chuckled, shaking his head. ‘They want everything. And they can take it,’ he said mockingly. ‘You’re just in the way.’ Alex knelt down grinning beside it, and ate it alive while it screamed. Blue blood crept reflective across the fibrous white floor.

Alex belched as he left the hangar. He wiped the blue gore off his face, and blew out the burp on hot bloody breath. Whistling on down the alien corridor, with a happy strut. Meals always felt good. He hadn’t eaten his fill though. It was ok for a starter, he supposed, but he didn’t really feel any stronger.

As usual. He felt a fresh hunger already, burning like a furnace. Metabolism goals. There’d only been a couple of meals that’d given him any new power, since they’d heard the Minister’s invitation to these new worlds. And set out to find Tabitha. It was a good fight though. At least she’d shown some spirit, unlike the rest. Even if their grand super-rematch deluxe royale hadn’t quite ended like he’d hoped.

‘Fucking space dragon,’ he muttered to himself, punching a dent in the living wall as he walked on. For the second time now, it was the only reason that bitch was still alive.

Still. I got what I wanted, and the Watchers didn’t. Can’t have everything. Not all at once, anyway. He raked a dark clawed hand across his face to try it out again, drawing silver blood. He felt the skin knitting and healing quickly, and grinned. He had Tabitha’s ability; finally.

Strolling on, he wiped his bloody fingers on the feathery fronds down the white ribbed corridors. A few hallways even looked familiar by now. He stopped suddenly, at a sunny birdsong thought. Dappling sunshine, dancing through leaves in June. A cold sweet drink, and a happy frantic dog. A buried memory; so dear to him that it felt sacred. Something else gripped it, and twisted it. Buried it back and burned it.

Alex stared at the corridor in amnesia, and shrugged. Whistling a bright catchy pop tune as he headed off for his next toy, locked away in its cell.

‘So what’re you, the deus ex machina?’ said Alex, with a black piranha grin. ‘The magic secret weapon, to help your buddies fight the good fight?’

‘Who are you?’ the Celestial said weakly, in English; downloaded from Tabitha’s confiscated wristcom on Serenity. Alex put an arm over the being’s shoulder and led him out down the brilliant white corridor, like an old friend.

‘Oh, I’m no one, really,’ Alex replied warmly. A passing Watcher studied his vicious stare and walked by down the corridor, clearly furious. Alex and the Celestial walked on alone. ‘See, I’m a rare exception in a species which is essentially fucked,’ he said with a grin. ‘Sorry, I mean doomed. Excuse my language,’ he muttered pleasantly, patting his dirty mouth. The Celestial waited in silence as they walked on. Trying repeatedly to carry out any kind of hack or physical assault it knew how. But the man had him pinned like a puppet in his electric field. This living ship, too. It had some species of blocking technology; vast and ever-present.

‘What do you want?’ said the Celestial. If he couldn’t combat this man, or this strange dark species he was exploiting... then he could at least try to understand them.

‘Hm. Well, I want everything,’ Alex replied, sincerely. ‘Same as these bastards. Just like they took everything from me.’ He glanced around at the walls.

‘Then why are you working with them?’ the Celestial replied.

‘I’m not working with them,’ Alex laughed. ‘I’m riding them, for everything I can take. Like getting to Tabitha.’

‘And they allow this?’ said the Celestial.

‘Look. They just want to feed me to the ship. Give it my cells and my power, something like that,’ Alex explained. ‘And every time they try, they get massacred,’ he chuckled. ‘So, they don’t try any more. They have to just... work around me!’ he said, deliriously. ‘It really pisses them off,’ he laughed. ‘So, I tag along and take all the power I can get. Soon as I work out how to use all this stuff... figure I’ll just kill them, and take it back to Earth. Wipe them out, and start over.’

‘Alone?’ said the Celestial, trying to reason with him. ‘Why not work with your race, to reclaim your world and rebuild it together? With Tabitha?’ Alex stopped walking. He just held him with a dark stare.

‘This one begins to understand,’ said the Celestial. ‘These beings destroyed your race. You could not protect the ones you cared about,’ it said. ‘Now you fixate on becoming stronger, alone. To shield yourself from grief, guilt, and dependence,’ it said, gently. ‘You compensate for your trauma and vulnerability, in the only way you know how. Anger. Constructing armour around yourself, so that you will not suffer again.’ It held Alex’s stare. ‘This one was similar, once. This one lost its kind, and raged against the purpose of its creation. You will take everything you can, and destroy everything you cannot. This one knows what you experience. Let this one help you, to find another way.’

‘Deep,’ Alex agreed, thoughtfully. ‘I mean, yeah. Maybe. Who knows,’ he shrugged. ‘Plus there’s this thing in me, that isn’t me,’ he chuckled, tapping his head. ‘Or... maybe I just do all this because I can,’ he said with a grin. He drove the knife in deep with a slick, glassy crunch. Pinning the Celestial below the jaw, with the thick black blade. Just to stop that synthetic, patronising voice that kept hitting his raw nerves, over and over again. Grinning as the thing bled glistening nanofluid down his hand.

‘What are you doing?’ the Celestial asked him curiously, painlessly. Alex chuckled in surprise that it was still speaking; watching its glowing featureless face as it tried to scan his emotions.

Good luck with that. Let me know if you find them.

‘What are you doing?’ the Celestial repeated, placing a hand on Alex’s arm to gently push the dripping knife away. Alex grinned; wild-eyed. He wrestled the Celestial to the ground and tore its throat. It was still asking questions, oblivious to fear and pain. Asking him why he was doing this.

‘You’re too dumb to be a superbeing,’ Alex chuckled, as he wrenched its reaching arm away and gulped the shining fluid. He gagged and choked on the metal taste of it, and went back for more anyway. Wetting his throat for the first mouthful of its weird glass flesh.

‘What are you doing?’ the thing asked him again, stunned and gored on the floor, as he ripped open its chest and devoured its turning heart. ‘What will this achieve?’

‘I have no idea,’ Alex chuckled, spitting shreds of supercircuit as he spoke. ‘But I can’t wait to find out.’

‘Perhaps this one could help you find another way, to accomplish your–

‘Would you shut the fuck up!?’ Alex yelled at it, spraying glowing shards from his mouth. Punching its head to pieces. ‘I’m eating!’ He hit it, again and again. By the time he’d done beating it quiet, the Celestial’s head was a smashed scatter of spindly stuff. A million crystalline constructs, all blinking out one by one. Dead forever. That eerie light behind its featureless face, which had glowed for millions of wiser and more peaceful years than these, flickered and faded away.

‘Well. That was disappointing,’ Alex mumbled eventually, once he’d forced down the last pieces of artificial brain and heart he could manage. There was nothing; no sensation. It was different with the Watchers he’d fed on; that was a sudden golden hit. No, wait... there was something there, he supposed. A vague feeling, like a sickness, or the lightest hangover. He felt... well, he felt like he’d just eaten a pound of glassy stone and circuits. No new abilities. All he wanted to do was heave. He stood up and spewed against a ribbed immaculate wall, and spat the metal taste of glittering nanofluid. Breathing deep against the wall’s clinical protein smell. Distinctly unimpressed with his meal, Alex wandered off distractedly, punching dents in the corridor walls. Prowling the ship’s fleshy labyrinth toward the bridge.

The monstrous mothership crawled on towards a world that shone like a beacon. It slid through the endless black like it was born from it, vast and whale-bodied and tentacled; an eater of worlds. Some ancient god-colossus of the abyss. For miles around the Ministry’s endless warships swarmed in to fight it, and shut down, and tumbled lifelessly in the unseen field that was pulsing from it. Consoles died and artillery froze before a shot was fired. Guardians floated weightlessly, trapped and yelling in the dark. A thousand fearsome starships, with a thousand panicked suffocating crews; dwarfed and drifting powerless in its wake.

63

A young family on Serenity sat around a modest picnic in a sunkissed park. In the distance, sparse visitors enjoyed the bright birdsong afternoon. Noisy schoolkids of every species played hoverball on the lawns; an old couple fed batbirds peacefully by the lake. The skyscraper sprawl of Capital City towered on all sides beyond the trees.

Picking idly at a blade of grass, the pretty young wife watched her husband feed their babbling baby daughter from the picnic she’d put together. She smiled when her husband glanced at her; smiled right from the eyes. She wondered if he knew, that she didn’t love him any more. Wondered what he’d do if she told him, and told him he was right; that work had finally gotten in the way. She tried to picture his heartbreak and confusion when she finally told him that it wasn’t just someone else, but a woman. Not only that... a woman from an alien race. Not even Ministry. A pale, red-haired, golden-eyed woman, from a distant planet called Earth.

‘Looks like a storm’s coming,’ Anero said quietly, as the distant sky greyed over the city. Feeding Lea one last spoonful of tasty colourful mush.

‘Yeah,’ Saa mumbled, lost in her guilty thoughts. Feeling far away where she sat beside him, as she packed Lea’s things away. She’d really been ready to tell him, too. But thinking about it... it was better just left forgotten. Four lives damaged, for the sake of a crush?

Grow up, Saa. Leave it in the past.

The distant clouding sky was getting darker, faster. Blacker than they’d ever seen before. Growing a little uneasy, Saa glanced around at other people in the park, who were pointing and chattering about it. As if night was bleeding through in the distance, black and gigantic over the city, on a sunny afternoon. Rising on the wind, a near-imperceptible hum.

All across the Capital City, smiling crowds of every species watched the sky fill with shooting stars. They had their drones and robots take pictures. A faint, distant, high-pitched chorus; heavenly papercuts in the blue. Strange though; there’d been no meteorite forecast on the news. All the holo-screens in the busy bars and pristine homes were flickering off, one by one. Suddenly the star net was down, all over; miles of hologram billboards dimmed and died. Worried calls cut out, as busy stores and chattering cafes went dark.

Guardian defences wouldn’t start up. Ministry communications stuttered and stopped. A massive uneasy feeling grew in the chests of millions, like something was pushing through them invisibly. Ministers and dignitaries were ushered away for mountain retreats.

In the towering heart of the capital, superstars in robotic haute-couture were suddenly half-naked in the dark, as the lights failed and the cameras died, and their writhing clothes fell limp and powerless. Ships and aircars veered and cut out in their thousands, and began to dip and fall from the sky. They burst into flames against the garden-city skyscrapers, and blew like bombs in the screaming streets below. The distant sky was a vast twisting thunderstorm over the terrified city, as some black impossible mass crawled in from space. Running yells and desperate shouts filled the capital on a dry ozone wind. A cold glow grew in the churning fallout; volcanic clouds hid a vast monstrosity. The screaming streets filled with running crowds. Up above them, a twisting tower of light bit downtown in a doming, deafening blast; churning buildings skywards in a flailing stonework hurricane. A hellish static thunder shook the tremoring streets, and filled the world with a deathly roar. Lights, buildings, cities and nations flickered and stopped in a screaming blackout apocalypse. Tiny shapes were tumbling from the ship in their thousands, like iron waterfalls. Silver spiders and hulking black brutes, crashing down in the screaming streets.

‘Everyone, into the Ministry!’ an old man called out in the square. Ushering panicked families and tourists up the steps from the vast city plaza, to the towering halls of power above. ‘We’ll be safer inside the Ministry, until the Guardians get here! Everyone in! Come on!’ he reached out to a panicked young family, running from the direction of the park.

‘What’s happening!?’ said Saa, holding crying Lea close.

‘I don’t know ma’am, but you’ll all be safer inside!’ the old man urged her, with a gentle hand to guide her on. But they’d never get in; not now. Shouting crowds filled the gigantic steps to the Ministry building; a frantic crush of people was swelling at the doors. Saa looked back hopelessly at the city, her hair tousled on a cold smoke-smelling wind. The sky was a vast churning hell behind them; there weren’t any Guardian ships to save them. Only that dark monstrosity, dwarfing the gloomy city below. Peering into their world in rot-black domination; wreathed in cloud and lightning glows. Cloaked in sprawling oblivion.

‘Wait!’ said Saa, watching the tree line and the dark thundering sky. ‘There’s something coming!’

‘Come on!’ her husband replied. Pushing her on with the yelling crowd. ‘Saa! We have to get inside!’ she shook her arm from his grip to watch the tree line.

‘There,’ she said. Even through the crowd’s panicked shouting in the darkened city square, they could hear the fevered mumbling too. Hundreds turned to watch the far edge of the plaza, as screams and shouts ran deafening through the crowd. A sudden horde of clattering metal came bursting through the distant trees; a writhing tidal wave. Scuttling silver spiders in their hundreds. A staring brute among them, like a living furnace. A sea of hurtling monsters, come to wipe them out. Thumping and clattering across the plaza for the screaming crowd.

‘I love you!’ Anero shouted desperately, panic-eyed in the yelling crowd. Clutching Saa close in their pulse-racing horror; Lea wailing between them. He shielded them from it; trembling in fear against the silver tide. The coming massacre. The screaming crowd jumped in fright when a great black terror hit the square, with a sudden ground-shaking thump. Star-eyed and snarling savage in its dustcloud; a prehistoric giant with a red-haired rider. A dark primal machine that stood growling between them and the coming horde; tail whipping and arms smashing into the stones. Tabitha leapt from Seven to sprint at the swarm in the plaza. Hard black feet thumping across the cracking tiles as she hurtled full-force through the screeching spiders. She pounced snarling on the charging brute and clawed its eyes bloody. Dragged it aside by a gory socket to tear its screaming head in her hands. She swung herself across its shoulders to rip its armour away. Rammed in her claws with a spurt of silver blood and wrenched its spine in two. Tabitha leapt from its toppling shoulders, as the dead juggernaut staggered and crashed in a bloodgushing wreck.

‘Seven!’ she yelled. He took a swelling breath and hurled thundering flames through the rushing spiders, turning half the screeching horde to molten ruins. He turned and threw another roaring white arc through the swarming spiders on their left; annihilated them. Tabitha hunted the stragglers to bury her knife in and tear them apart. She sprinted after one desperately as it charged for the screaming crowd. Chased it down and pounced on it to beat it bloody while they stared in shock. Silver-spattered, breathless in the sudden silence, Tabitha looked up at the sound of rising cheers. A thousand people at the Ministry gates, shouting and yelling for her. A sudden pride swelled in her heartcore, as Seven incinerated the last spiders at her back. For the first time in so long, Tabitha smiled.

‘Hey!’ she called to Seven, over the crackling flames. ‘Badass,’ she said with a grin. Seven glanced at her with a growl, and turned back to watch the tree line. ‘Just keep an eye on your right for–

Seven turned and spat another roaring jet, melting the creeping spiders into glowing molten goo.

‘...any more,’ Tabitha mumbled redundantly, looking away for anything else. Nothing came charging through the tree line for them, and there weren’t any scrawny grey dragons in the sky. Maybe that was it; the first wave was over.

‘It’s no Battle of New York, is it?’ she said, walking over to climb his wing. Seven found that intensely funny for no particular reason.

‘What?’ Tabitha chuckled, confused as she took the saddle. ‘You’re a strange one,’ she told him fondly, patting a scale. ‘Come on. We’ll circle the place, for anywhere else they can get in.’

The crowd watched and pointed at drifting shapes descending on the square. Strange furred savages and the Ministry’s own Guardians, spiralling down on parachutes, as their dead falling dropships exploded in the park.

‘Everyone inside, please!’ a skinny blue woman told the crowd; arms spread and dressed neck to toe in Guardian armour. The crowd saw the gleaming suit and obeyed Aelu without question, chattering noisily as they made their way up the steps. Irren rushed over to join the crowd, still shaken from his parachute jump. People pointed and stared at an amphibian giant, stomping over to guard the huge stairway; wrenching a short heavy lamp post from the concrete to shoulder it like a club. High above, the fire-breathing monster circled the Ministry with staring white eyes.

Tabitha swept Seven around the vast building again, watching the crowds streaming in from the city streets. The clouds burned bright orange around a sinking sun, where the sky still showed through the fallout. Down below, the troops and her Sky Tribe were landing together to form ranks in the empty plaza. All around them stood the corpse of paradise; the blacked-out supercity and the dark storm skies, looming heavy in the fresh apocalypse. That writhing black ship, chewing up the distant towers with its twisting white light. Lurking beneath its living hull, the Watchers who’d taken her world. And Alex. Dipping into Seven’s thoughts, she felt his anger like a silverbright shotgun firework. He was ready to tear off right now, and burn Alex alive. His fury reflected hers, though it was hard to find the join any more. She couldn’t always tell where Seven’s rage ended and hers began.

I know, she told him. But this isn’t just about us. We have to help these people first. We have to help the tribe. Seven growled, bloodthirsty and cheated, as she steered him back for the plaza. Her Sky Tribe were under no illusions; she’d told them that they’d face death gods if they came here. An army of darkness. And still they came, fearless in Fierce-Hope, because their Sky Queen needed them. The peaceful Lost Spirits of Serenity needed them; they didn’t know how to be warriors.

Armoured shutters had covered the parliament building’s colossal windows, just like Atha had said; the giant complex was practically a fortress. The only real place that could shelter the city’s vast crowds, and where their soldiers could make a stand. Tabitha just hoped that the Watchers’ ship would keep crawling away now, past the built-up centre, towards the vast plants in the energy district.

They’ll wipe out any way to make power first. At least it gave the city a little more time.

‘More of them!’ said Big Fish, hefting his lamp-post club. Watching massing spiders in the distance. Aelu pulled her knife and baton beside him, watching the coming horde.

‘Get everyone inside! Now!’ Atha commanded his troops from the plaza steps. His men and women guided the city crowds quickly through the heavy parliament doors. Many of them had family on Serenity; just hoping and praying they were alright. They’d returned aboard the Vigilance, from strange vicious tours on Stormworld, to even stranger horrors on the Ministry capital.

‘Bronzebacks!’ Swift Blood yelled in growling Stormish, in the sudden silence. The tribe’s tall plainspeople rushed into the defence formation they’d been practising; levelling their clattering spears together at the foot of the Ministry steps.

‘Red-Eyes!’ Cold Moon called out, leading the marsh clan between them with bone and hide shields, to form a shuffling wall. A living barricade around the parliament steps. All watching in silence as silver spiders crept into the plaza, where Seven’s flames died down.

‘Cave Clan, fire!’ Stone Shore bellowed on the middle steps, dropping his outstretched arm. The brown-furs let loose a thrumming cloud of glass-headed arrows, climbing high over the plaza; a whistling rain that skewered scores of spiders and clattered on the paving around them. Sky Tribe stood together in snarling ranks as the straggling spiders rushed across the square. They came screeching and scuttling and crashing into the Red-Eyes’ shield wall like a tide, as the Bronzebacks roared and speared them in shrieking silver bursts. Big Fish came stomping down the stairside, black stripes flushing angrily. Clubbing the spiders apart with roaring swipes. Aelu defended the top gates with the Guardians; rushing over to knife a climbing spider that crept up the wall. Cave Clan circled behind the shrinking spider horde; culling them with a second whistling volley of arrows. Dropping the stragglers that turned on them, as the tribals on the steps speared the last survivors. Sea Mist grunted her satisfaction at Barkless Tree’s side, looking over the spiders’ silver bodies for any left alive. Dark Storm had warned them before they arrived that these spiders were fast and dangerous, and that a single sting meant death. No different to hunting some of their more aggressive kinds of breakfast then, Sea Mist had replied. The tribe learned to handle fast and deadly from birth, or they didn’t eat. These spiders’ pale flesh and bright silver blood looked delicious.

‘Don’t eat them!’ Tabitha warned her again, as she landed Seven down in the plaza. ‘How many times did I tell you?’ Sea Mist shrugged and shook her head. ‘You’re a lying bugger, Sea Mist. You’ve got your skinning knife in your hand,’ Tabitha accused her. ‘Don’t eat them.’

‘Won’t,’ Sea Mist grunted, like a grumpy teenager. Tabitha watched the edges of the plaza again, just to make sure. The second wave of spiders had been smaller. It looked like the Watchers’ swarm had left this place alone, at least for now.

‘Sky Tribe!’ she called out to their ranks. ‘Good work,’ she said with a smile.

‘I’m impressed,’ Atha called over to her, walking across from the foot of the steps. ‘I mean, despite the fact we’re in the middle of a fucking horrifying alien apocalypse. We’ve saved thousands of people in there.’

And failed millions more, Tabitha told herself. But the sooner we act, the more people we could save. I just hope this works.

‘There’ll be more spiders,’ she replied. ‘There’s always more. Watch the square, Seven,’ she said, turning to him. ‘And look out for your brothers and sisters,’ she added, watching the empty sky. Seven grunted and lay down to guard the plaza.

‘We need to move fast,’ said Atha, as they climbed the Ministry steps together. ‘Plan a counterattack, while that ship’s busy destroying the power district,’ he said, glancing at it miles away. ‘It’s the least populated area in the capital, thank the gods.’ They turned at a distant static rumble. The steps tremored beneath their feet, as the mothership spewed another tower of light to wipe out the power plants. Lurking in its own vast fallout.

‘You should take Seven over the city,’ Atha suggested. ‘Get as many Guardians and civilians here as you can. Still plenty of room in there. More hands willing to fight, and we might even stand a chance of defending ourselves.’

‘Good idea,’ Tabitha agreed. She never thought she’d agree with him, before now. But there were bigger problems than their own animosity. ‘I need to try something first,’ she said, producing a weird withered shape from her belt. A strange new hybrid, glassy and glowing.

‘What the hell’s that?’ he said, walking alongside her, as she headed on up the parliament steps.

‘A Hearthfire,’ she replied, holding the plant like it was a baby bird. Her hard black hands still painted in spider blood.

‘...A what?’ Atha frowned.

‘A village fire, kind of. Like we have on Stormworld,’ she explained. ‘A light to gather round. ...I hope.’

‘Is that really that important right now?’ said Atha, confused.

‘Trust me, it’s important,’ Tabitha replied. ‘It’ll help us turn all those strangers in there into one tribe. And get them to fight back. It’ll give them hope.’ ...I hope.

‘If you say so,’ Atha replied sincerely, as they reached the top of the steps. ‘If you need my Guardians, just take charge. You know more about all this than I do.’

‘What?’ Tabitha replied, taken back. Since when had he been capable of humility?

‘Well, you do,’ Atha shrugged. ‘I mean, you’ve fought these things before, haven’t you? You’re the expert on these monsters. You proved it right here.’ Atha looked around at his Guardians, standing in ranks by the doors. Terrified. They were counting on him to keep them alive. Against this strange new enemy though, and without any of the weapons they’d trained to use... he didn’t know if he could.

‘Look. This is your army now,’ he said, glancing at his Guardians. ‘Take the lead,’ he told her, with a stern nod. ‘I’ll follow.’

‘...Alright,’ Tabitha replied, still shocked at what she was hearing. ‘Clear the way, please,’ she said, nodding at the vast crowd through the Ministry’s open doors.

‘Yes ma’am,’ said Atha, walking on ahead. He switched from humbled comrade back to full-metal drill sergeant in an instant. ‘Make way for the Sky Queen! Move!’ he bellowed at the crowd, splitting them down the middle as he walked through the Ministry’s giant entrance. Tabitha joined her Ghosts nervously, and headed inside.

‘Queen,’ said Stone Shore beside her, untying something that circled his left arm. A horned black ring. Her crown.

‘Thank you,’ Tabitha replied, smiling gratefully. Taking it, but reluctant to put it on.

I thought I’d managed to lose this on Stormworld. Maybe she could just carry it, or give it to Sea Mist to hold.

‘Queen,’ Barkless insisted, pointing to it. ‘For, tribe. For, Deep Roots.’ Tabitha watched him smiling, and nodded with a sigh. She put it on as they walked through the doors.

‘Make way!’ Atha bellowed at the crowd, as his Guardians ushered them apart through the Ministry’s vast halls. The sea of jostling people stared at the strange ranks that were filing through. Lines of fierce ancient savages, brown and bronze and scaled furless black. Scrawny grey and giant white. All adorned in beads and bones; their glass knives and spears glinted in the windows’ sunset glow. Striding proudly through the staring crowds, like an old tale come to life. An even stranger group walked on ahead. A giant, a blue woman and two savages, all in Guardian armour; all with cave-art ghosts finger-painted on their chestplates. Leading them was some pale new species, red-haired and golden-eyed, with a volt-arcing flower glowing in her hands. They walked on across the silent staring gardens, as another distant pillar of light shot a thundering earthquake through the city. The staring crowds watched them walking through, hoisting up their kids to see. Muttering rumours about the Savages of Stormworld. Their great winged terror. The Sky Queen, in her antlered crown.

‘Any sign of the Ministers?’ Tabitha asked Aelu beside her, as they headed on through the staring crowd in the Ministry’s gardens.

‘Hm. There’s still a handful of staff and backbenchers, trying to keep the peace. Helping people who were caught in the crush,’ Aelu replied. ‘Admirable, but no one with a real voice. Most of the Ministers were escorted out of the back doors, from what I’m told. The few that were here, anyway.’

‘There’s no Ministers here?’ Tabitha said angrily.

‘It’s not the Ministers they’re looking to,’ Aelu replied, as they walked through the crowd to the cloistered courtyard.

‘Just a wild guess,’ said Big Fish. ‘But I’d say they’re watching the one who saved their lives with a fire-breathing monster.’

‘I can’t lead all these people by myself,’ Tabitha mumbled. Starting to panic. Oh god. Mum. Help.

‘Just, lead. Like Sky Tribe,’ said Sea Mist, with a reassuring smile.

‘Bigger, Sky Tribe,’ Barkless added brightly, patting her on the back. Nodding her on across the packed staring courtyard. Tabitha breathed deep, and sighed nervously. They headed on for a clear flowered space, in the heart of the courtyard.

‘Just stay with me, ok?’ she told her Ghosts nervously, as they walked out to the plants and fountain in the centre. Except... they weren’t with her. Tabitha looked back in silent shock to see her friends a million miles away, in the staring crowd.

‘Ok, your Majesty,’ said a bright-skinned little girl in the silence, sitting half-hidden in the tall flowers beside her. Tabitha stared at her in surprise, and blocked out the silent crowd. ‘I did a picture of you, and your crown. But it’s at home,’ the little girl explained. ‘I need to colour in your dragon different though,’ she said, very seriously, as she picked flowers for her bunch. ‘I did him blue. But you brought him with you this time, and he’s not blue. He’s black,’ she admitted. ‘I can do another picture, though. I’ll do a better one. You can have it.’

‘I’d really like that, thank you,’ Tabitha said quietly, smiling to her. When the little girl smiled back Tabitha thought her heartcore would burst. A couple in the grinning crowd were waving and whispering to their young daughter in utter embarrassment, trying to coax her back from the clearing.

‘But she wants me to stay with her,’ the little girl called back. Tabitha shook her head at the girl’s parents in the chuckling crowd, and smiled to tell them it was fine.

‘What’s that?’ said the girl, pointing to the strange twisted stem in Tabitha’s hard hand.

‘Watch,’ Tabitha replied, as quietly as she could; a smiling secret between the two of them. She knelt and scooped a handful of rich black soil away, and planted the warped new moonflower with that electric scent. A glowing glassy half-breed, grown around the Celestial’s shard; the only one of its kind. Please work.

‘I need you to go and stand right back with your parents now, ok?’ said Tabitha.

‘Ok,’ the little girl nodded, wide-eyed, and ran back to her parents to watch in silence.

‘Keep back folks,’ Atha spoke up in the silence, looking around at nodding faces in the crowd. He almost felt like a real, public-serving Guardian again.

Breathing in the summer-breeze silence, Tabitha touched a volt-crackling finger to the new flower. A small brilliant light in the gloomy dusk. She felt her heartcore leap when it grew. Felt that strange familiar connection with it, from her heartcore to her head; a hypralised juicybright sensation from the Celestial’s living remain. As she put her black sparking hands on it, the muttering crowd watched it grow visibly into something that was neither plant nor machine, but somewhere between the two. The circuit-veined bloom creaked up from a glassy flower to a sapling, to a chunky alien tree. Glowing with a clear white light. What was more, it hummed. Like a generator. Crackling with great writhing volts. It wasn’t the Celestial; it didn’t think or move. At least not that she could tell. But it had those same glow-pulsing circuits running through it; bright and angular. Producing current, somehow, in a world that had none. With Fishbowl’s help here, she might even be able to breed it. The muttering crowd was staring at it; a sea of faces lit in the plant’s calm glow. They watched shoots and budding blooms rise and open in the flowers around it, shining with halos like ghostly candles. A calm eerie garden, that pushed away the blackout gloom of the world. A living Hearthfire. An oasis of light in the dark.

‘It’s... kind of a solar generator,’ she told her Ghosts, and the staring crowd. She felt exactly like she was presenting the strangest science project in the galaxy, to every race in the galaxy. The crowd looked weirded out in the thing’s electric glow.

‘It’s a plant?’ said a reptilian man, confused.

‘Half-plant,’ Tabitha tried to explain. ‘The other half is...’ How do I tell them it’s a genetically engineered tech-plant hybrid of the remnant of an ancient super-advanced artificial intelligence, recovered in a galactic military heist, and later spliced with mutated bioluminescent parasitic flowers already altered by my nanotech blood, on a distant prehistoric world?

‘...not,’ she finished uncertainly. ‘But anyway. We should be able to use this as a power source, so we’re not totally blacked out in here.’

‘But there’s nothing left to power. All the circuits are fried,’ said a tall figure in the muttering crowd.

True, Tabitha told herself. But what if?... Could that work? She knew it was a longshot. But no one had seen anything like the Celestial before.

It worked with the moonflowers, so... She pulled a cutting from the glowing tree, and pressed it against the dead wristcom on her arm. Feeding it current from her gripping hand. Watching in silent fascination, as the shifting circuit-veined material melded with the wristcom itself. Growing over and through it, hacking it by some ancient genetic design, to turn the small computer gradually organic like itself. One by one, her Ghosts and the crowd came closer to see what she was doing.

‘...What’s that?’ said Big Fish, studying the weird matter in fascination.

‘It’s changing your wristcom?’ Atha muttered.

‘Looks like the Celestial,’ Big Fish mumbled, touching the fibrous material and its glowing leaf-veins beneath. When the wristcom screen flickered back to life, they stared silently in its sudden glow. The only working electronic in the world.

‘Puts spirit, inside. From, tree. Maybe Deep Roots spirit, inside,’ said Barkless, meeting Tabitha’s smiling look.

‘So this is... Watcher-proof tech?’ said Aelu. ‘You can grow it?’ Gripped with curiosity, Tabitha took Atha’s dead laser rifle from him, and pressed a shred of the living matter against it. She fed it current from her fingers until the material spread and fleshed, and worked its way through the rifle. A shudder and a high small droning, and the lights on the weird hybrid weapon blinked back to life. It looked... Celestial.

‘That’s... it’s...’ Aelu trailed off. Lost for words.

‘...We can hack dead circuits into living machines,’ Tabitha told her Ghosts, and the silent crowd around them. Thinking far bigger than just defending the Ministry building. ‘It’s how we fight back.’

Tabitha looked around at the staring crowd. She picked a halo flower and shot bright volts through it, lighting their faces in the gloom. Bringing the dark space back to glowing life. She thought for a few silent moments, and cleared her throat.

‘The Watchers wiped out my world. Now they want to do the same to you,’ she told the crowd. ‘You have to understand. The Watchers don’t want anything from you. They want to annihilate you. They want your planet. They want everything there is,’ she said. She glanced across the crowd of nervous faces, silent and staring. ‘They can’t be reasoned with,’ she told them, raising her voice. ‘They won’t stop until they’ve wiped you out! This is a war for your existence!’ she watched their frightened stares. ‘I’m here to fight that war with you. We all are,’ she said, glancing around at Atha’s Guardians; at Sky Tribe; her Ghosts. Standing close around her. ‘You have to fight for your lives! Join us!’ she called to the crowd. ‘We can fight them, together, and we can win! Rise up, and fight for your world!’ Tabitha’s words met a wall of coughing silence. Deep in the crowd, Saa looked around at all those chattering faces. All watching the strange woman in the clearing. People were muttering and shaking their heads. Asking one another why the Guardians couldn’t fight this war for them, like they were supposed to. Like they always had. Frightened people, who did nothing.

Tabitha looked around silently, losing hope. But there was someone tall coming through the crowd; an entourage followed in his wake. The lightning-ribboned master of ceremonies. The man with the warning, with eyes like twin galaxies, from the beautiful high-rise bar. He turned and bowed to the chattering crowd; the smiling trillionaire. Kneeling before the Sky Queen with his entourage, for everyone to see. Tabitha stared in surprise; watching his cryptic smile.

‘...Kneel down with me,’ Saa told her husband in the crowd.

‘What?’ Anero replied, holding Lea close.

‘Just kneel with me. Come on.’ The two of them pushed out politely through the crowd, baby Lea in arms, and knelt down in the clearing too.

Is that... Saa? Tabitha could’ve cried to see her again; she was equally shocked to see she had a family. Just glad she was alright. Sea Mist and Barkless watched the stranger and his retainers, and the young family, kneeling where Tabitha stood. Smiling, they came forward and followed suit. Aelu nudged Big Fish to kneel down with her; Atha ordered his troops to follow. Choosing a new leader, for the war to come.

Tabitha looked around the glowing grove in silent shock, and suddenly wished she wasn’t right at the centre. All through the crowd, people of every species came forward with growing resolve. Ready to follow the red-haired stranger, who’d saved their families’ lives. They knelt to her bloodspattered silhouette, in the volt-tree’s hybrid glow. The bareknuckle princess. Their mythic warrior queen.

*

EPILOGUE

In a distant star system, a blue and green planet was being redeveloped by an alien race. Left to settle and re-nature by its new owners, while their living weapons cleared and built, as they headed on for a promising cluster of more prospective planets. Another paradise world out there, among many. So wholly reliant on electricity that they’d never seen an opportunity like it.

Earth was one vast overgrown garden in the ruins, empty of humanity. Towering crystalline structures had sprung up all along the coasts, where humanity’s devastation had been cleared and recycled. Fallen cities and toppled monuments were mossing over; rusting through in the pouring rain. Across the world, untamed lawns, farms and stadiums were growing into sapling forests and cow-roaming meadows. Swallows darted and swept low for bugs where the bee-buzzing wildflowers crowded back.

In empty greening capitals, blackbirds and sparrows chirped and fluttered over grassing streets in the bright sunlight. Nature nested and cobwebbed and mushroomed and crawled, in acres of rotting greenhousing cars. Alien lizards scrambled through long cracks in toppled buildings. Tree-lined streets had dropped their autumn leaves; the fallen litter had wintered to dark urban mulch where the weeds poked through. Writhing black trees and orb-headed blooms fought the native plants for rain and sunlight. Drowning out the weeds and saplings in old parks and wild fields, or drowned out themselves where they grew too slow.

In a rainy seaside ruin, where the houses once stood tall and thin, a pier and a long iron railing had rusted into the sea. Maggots and seagulls ate at the last stinking shreds of a monstrous alien squid, long since exploded in the road, and never wondered why it was there. Away on a silent street, a wilding housecat shook and pounced and caught a rat in the grassing breeze-blown rubble. She checked the brickdust meadow warily, for feral dogs roaming hungry, and hurried across for the bushes to feed her mongrel kittens. The biggest in the mewling litter was black and boisterous and always ate first, just like his wandering father; a big scarred tom with a good strong purr, who’d once been bought by an office worker with her first wages. More fearful of lightning than most.

Far to the north on the Isle of Skye, among the black rock spires half-covered in creeping green, an old woman watched the brightening clouds from her dripping ancient cave. She clutched her many layers tighter, and grumbled when the cold sea-smelling wind came howling past. Her craggy old face was lit by a small flickering fire in the deep cold dark. She turned stiffly and picked up a great treasure, balanced in the jagged rocks by her side. Slurped it in the cave-drip silence.

‘Ooh, that’s nice,’ she agreed with herself, sipping a rare cup of hot steaming tea, with real milk in it too. Well... real tinned milk, at least. She could barely remember how real real milk tasted. It was so nice to have tea for once; she didn’t even mind that it was too hot to gulp.

‘Well, make it last,’ a young woman replied, deeper in the cave behind her. ‘We’ve literally got three teabags left between all of us.’

‘That word again,’ the old woman muttered, with a look of distaste. ‘Everything’s always literally with people your age.’

‘Oh, shush and drink your tea,’ the young woman told her gently, standing up to stretch her stiff muscles. ‘And don’t sit out here too long. You’ll catch cold.’

‘Hot tea’s always best in the cold,’ the old woman countered, slurping at her cup. ‘My father always said that.’

My father always said that, the blonde young woman said in her head, mouthing the familiar words silently behind her. Your father always said everything. Don’t suppose he shared his infinite wisdom on how to survive an alien apocalypse, by any chance? Sighing, the young woman slung her rifle and headed down into the bustling main cavern. It was getting crowded in here, and still people insisted on fumbling around in the dark and making more screaming babies to find food for. Still... making babies was kind of essential, she supposed. Under the circumstances.

‘General!’ said a gangly teenager, running up to her in the dim candlelit dark. ‘Big Steve needs you to see something up top, General.’

‘You don’t need to call me General, Zayn,’ the woman replied. ‘It was a joke. By someone who really isn’t that funny.’

‘Oh,’ the new boy replied, clearly disappointed. ‘Well, anyway, Big Steve says he needs you to–

‘Alright, I’m going,’ the young woman cut in, with a weary smile. ‘Do me a favour and go out with the hunters today, will you? We’re running out of rabbits.’

‘Yes Gen– er, yep. No problem.’ With that he went running off for the group by the main cave entrance. Busily skinning whatever they could catch or fish in the cold countryside beyond the cavern.

Seriously, where do these kids get all that bloody energy, on the starvation diet we’re living on here? She still dreamt about tinned hotdogs sometimes; she hadn’t seen any since the castle. Just the taste of that squishy salty garbage, and a nice plump squidgy bun wrapped around it. With fried onions on top. And ketchup. And mustard. A plateful of them. No, a barrel of them. Hot and steaming. She was just torturing herself now. She headed on for the high entrance, to Up Top.

‘What do you want, loser?’ she asked the tall man, watching the coast from the cliffs. She smacked his arse affectionately as she came to stand beside him. Big Steve grinned at her; his stubbly face creased as he smiled.

‘Just saw some people down there, on the shore,’ he said, with a scarred-throat voice.

‘Where?’ the blonde woman replied, suddenly animated. Staring at the distant shoreline to search for any sign of them. She snatched his binoculars for a better look, without worrying if he was still attached.

‘Christ, woman,’ he grumbled, pulling off the binocular cord before she strangled him.

‘Oops. Sorryyy,’ she smiled.

‘Don’t,’ said Big Steve.

‘Don’t what?’

‘Bat your eyelashes at me.’

‘But you like my eyelashes.’

‘I know I do. That’s why... don’t.’

‘You don’t make sense.’

‘Your face doesn’t make sense.’

‘Muhh, yor faze duzn’t make senz.’

‘Grow up.’

‘You grow up. ...Smelly.’

‘Should we look for the survivors, or?’ he chuckled. ‘They disappeared behind that cliff, down there,’ he said, pointing a dirt-darkened finger. ‘I need some volunteers to help me get them.’

‘How many were there?’ she replied.

‘Three. And a kid.’

‘Alright. But it’s the meeting now,’ she said, rubbing her tired face. ‘Take someone out.’

‘One won’t be enough to help me carry them up the slopes, if they’re all on death’s door,’ he replied. ‘Where’s the twins? They can help us carry their bags up. They’re strong little buggers.’

‘They’re in school, Steve. You can’t just keep pulling them out of class whenever you need some slave labour.’

‘Like there’s any point being in school at the end of the world,’ he chuckled.

‘Oi. There’s every point in it,’ she berated him. ‘Knowledge, discipline and routine. Same goes for all of us. You know that.’

‘Yeah. I know,’ Steve sighed wearily, sick of hearing it. ‘Don’t say it. Education’s what separates us from the gangs,’ he chanted, in a bored tone.

‘Well try to sound a bit more enthusiastic about it,’ the woman replied. ‘...I need your help, Steve,’ she told him, looking into his eyes. ‘I’m not the only one running this place. I can’t do this alone.’

‘You know I’ve got your back,’ he told her, gripping his wife’s hand. ‘But, you know I’m no good at that stuff,’ he said, glancing at the caves below. ‘School and speeches, and organising. I can’t do it,’ he said with a shrug. ‘I need you to take care of the ideas, love. Just let me keep everyone working, and fed... and guarded. And clothed. And waterproof. And healthy. And with enough firewood. And–

‘Alright, alright,’ the young woman chuckled, with a rare smile. Pretty as winter. ‘Bugger off, then. Get the new people.’

‘Come with me,’ he said, putting his arms around her waist. ‘We can get lost again. And lose all our clothes, in those bushes...’

‘Go and get the new people,’ she laughed, pushing him away. Steve grinned, and headed inside to round up a rescue party. Smiling, the woman looked out at the bleak windy countryside on her right, and the dark sun-gleaming sea stretching out forever on her left. She took one last deep breath in the cold fresh air before she headed back inside, and prayed for the strength to see through the day. And the meeting. She clomped down the well-worn entrance to the caves, down the narrow kneejerk passage. Through into the warm noisy cavern, where the fire-glowing village was hard at work.

‘Morning, Tunde,’ she called to the smiling man on the outcrop beside her, with the warm happy weariness of routine. She stepped up to the edge of the rise by the crackling fire, where the crowded village could see her below. The man struck a hanging boat panel that passed for a gong; a dull derelict chime echoed through the caves.

‘Morning,’ the young woman called out, with the confidence of practise.

‘Morning, Natalie,’ the growing crowd replied. The kids’ high voices shot through the adults’, keen and clear. They still had that rising classroom lilt to their voices that she remembered from school, back in the old world. She glimpsed her little brother and sister smiling in the crowd too, so much stronger and hardier since their winter from hell... but still smiling, as ever. She loved to see them smiling. She noticed Robert pinching Grace, to try and make her scream in the silence.

I’ll kill him.

‘...Some good news today, thankfully,’ Natalie called out to the crowd. ‘We’ve got some newcomers joining us this morning, so make them feel welcome.’ The crowd applauded; purely for the reason that more survivors had made it this far. ‘Steve’s heading out now to get them, with some volunteers. They’re looking like most of us did when we found this place, so let’s get some warm food in them,’ she told the nodding crowd. ‘Aside from that, it’s business as usual. So let’s knuckle down, and get in some real graft today,’ she told them, itching her nose. ‘The allotments are coming on well, so I want Growers helping out with Builders today please. I want that medical room finished off. And remember, everyone’s still a Fighter. That means everyone. So no more slacking on training time, or Steve will have you running sewage again. You know who you are. We haven’t had to be Fighters yet, but that’s no guarantee. Anyway, let’s get to work. Alright?’

‘Yes Natalie,’ the crowd called out in unison.

‘The Ghosts are rising,’ she finished.

‘The Ghosts are rising!’ the crowd chanted back.

* * *

TABITHA WILL RETURN IN

GHOST

* * *

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Find me on Twitter at @andrew_in_space

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Tabitha

Tales of the Strange and Grim

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