Within moments of the explosion, nothing remained of the once-massive Alliance ship.
Adam silently joined Yen in the cockpit, choosing to watch the empty space ahead instead of the vanishing debris behind. He sought the right words, but they failed to come. Instead, he settled on simple conversation to pass the time and help him think of something else.
“How long until we reach an Alliance outpost?” he asked softly. Glancing over his shoulder, he wasn’t surprised to see Buren in a sullen pose.
Yen cleared his throat, brushing away the thick emotion in his voice. “It’ll be almost a month before we’re able to find anything capable of transmitting to the High Council.”
“Once we get there, that’s only the beginning of what we need to accomplish,” Adam added, beginning a mental checklist of their future work. “We have to notify the High Council of the Empire’s invasion. We need to tell them about the genetic mutations on Purseus II. We have to warn them that something like it could exist elsewhere in Alliance space. We have to….”
The rest of the sentence went unsaid for fear of upsetting Yen further.
Finally, Yen said what Adam couldn't. “We have to notify them of all those who died.”
“I’m sorry, Yen. I truly am. Once we get there, we’ll have a whole lot to do.” He remembered his final conversation with Vance and the promise he made to look after the survivors. “We have lots of promises to keep.”
Yen slipped the ID tags from under his shirt. Holding them in his hand, he read the laser-etched name printed on both metal tags-
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Keryn, wiping sweat from her brow, drank in the cool air of the Academy’s auditorium. Her muscles still burned from the day’s aerial joust, but it wasn’t her solid finish in that exercise that kept an excited smile on her face. It was the two-month anniversary since she began training at the Academy, though even that milestone didn’t make her giddy. After two months, the first-year cadets were finally being given a long-denied luxury-mail.
Since their arrival, the instructors kept the students focused on their studies, not wanting them distracted by letters from home. Attrition rates dropped when cadets lacked access to letters telling them what they were missing. Two months into their training, those who wished to quit were already long gone. By then, mail made little difference to their training, aside from boosting morale.
Finding a seat in the crowded auditorium, Keryn sat in a chair beside Iana. Anticipation was palpable in the air, as others joined them. Since their inception of teamwork during the joust, both their popularity and core group of friends grew significantly. More than six students took seats around the pair, chatting idly about their successes and failures in the joust.
Keryn listened halfheartedly, knowing her true focus was on the stage and the mail that would soon be delivered.
A hush fell over the room, as a line of instructors entered from the rear of the auditorium and filed forward, carrying heavily laden bags of letters and boxes. By the time they reached the stage, the cadets were seated and quiet.
Speakers rumbled, as Victoria threw a hidden switch. When she spoke, her musical voice was amplified, filling the large chamber.
“As I call your name,” she began, sticking to the straightforward dialogue that marked her as the head instructor, “please come forward and collect your mail. Once you’ve received your packages, you may file out quietly and return to your rooms. You’re officially released for the rest of the day.”
One by one, instructors stepped forward and began calling off names, as they emptied their bags. Keryn frowned, as they went down the list. They were going alphabetically, which meant she was toward the end. She made herself comfortable, knowing nearly 150 students would receive mail before her, Iana included.
She tapped her foot impatiently against the back of the chair in front of her, much to the chagrin of the student occupying it. Keryn knew she should be calmer, that it was only mail from home, but she couldn't shed the eager energy flooding her system. Her anticipation turned to irritation, as she waited nearly half an hour before they broke into the higher range of the alphabet.
“Ralston,” an instructor called.
As that student claimed his mail, the instructor continued.
“Raylor. Reavil. Reihlaard. Ricynth.”
Keryn threw back her head and murmured, “You have to be kidding me.” She never guessed there were so many cadets with names starting with R, all of whom would be called first. The anticipation almost killed her. Her foot tapped more furiously, as she waited to hear her name.
“Riddell.”
She hurried to the stage. The instructor held out her bundle, as she walked by, which she quickly snatched from his hand and moved toward the rear of the auditorium. Though happy to finally hear her name, she was smart enough to hide her gloating smile, as she passed those who still waited, or whose names hadn’t been called. She felt terrible, as she struggled to imagine not having anyone who cared enough to write over the first two long months at the Academy.
Pushing through the heavy doors at the rear of the auditorium, Keryn turned and hurried down the hall toward her room, examining the bundle in her hands, as she walked. A few letters sat atop a small, nondescript brown package. The whole bundle was wrapped in thin, firm cord, tied in a knot on top.
As she walked, she dug her nails under the tight knot and fiddled with the bundle. Skipping the grace that would normally mark her movements, she tugged violently at the cord until she managed a firm-enough hold to loosen the knot. Sliding the ends of the cord through the small loops, she freed it and dropped it absently into a trashcan, as she walked past.
The first couple letters were in her father’s barely legible scrawl. Though they hadn’t parted on the best of terms, his disapproval of her career choice evident in his tone, he took the time to write at least a couple letters. The next letter, from her mother, was packed into a much-thicker envelope than the ones from her father. Her mother was verbose, writing small novels in every letter, even when Keryn was only conducting training a few islands away from their house. Still, she appreciated the sentiment.
Only one other letter was buried in the stack above the package. Addressed with sharp letters and almost slashing handwriting, she recognized Bellini’s printing. Keryn’s heart ached at the thought of her old friend, who, by now, was undergoing intense training to fully awaken the integrated Voice within her. In many ways, Bellini’s letter held her least and greatest interest. She was eager to find out what Bellini accomplished during the past few months, but the girl she spent so many fun-filled days with back home was gone, replaced by an amalgamation of her own personality and that of the Voice.
Sliding Bellini’s letter aside, as she reached her door, Keryn pushed into the room and tried to read the faded script on the dark-brown paper. Though she struggled to decipher the return address, the flourishing handwriting was unmistakable. Only Eza, her brother, wrote in such a fluid style. Throughout their childhood, Keryn often teased him about his effeminate printing.
Tossing the four letters aside with barely a thought, she tore into the thick, durable paper covering the package to reveal a simple white box. Offering only a passive grunt to Iana, as she sat on the bed, Keryn dropped the wrapping paper and, with great reverence, opened the box.
She saw a videodisk in a case. Written across the top in the same flourishing script were the words,
Climbing back off the bed, she walked toward the computer when a loud knock sounded on the partially closed door. Standing there, barely visible, was the folded wings black uniform of Victoria.
Keryn frozen halfway between the bed and the computer, disk in hand, cursing the interruption. Sighing, she
