I’d been a shy child, rarely opening up to strangers.
The Shadow military training soon hammered that out of me.
It was the only way to survive it.
The storm erupted for five whole days and I recalled celebrating it with dancing, food, and drink.
The storm was said to symbolize a major turning point in our species’ history.
Sometimes it was for the better, sometimes for the worse.
In this case, it was for the worse, not that we were to know that just yet.
But we soon would.
As the storm dissipated, blowing itself out after five days of activity, a new and forbidding force appeared.
The Shadow.
Thousands of alien vehicles descended.
They brutalized us, forcing the adults into slave labor, the children into military training camps.
Each soul was harvested for a single purpose:
To join the Shadow Empire and make them an even more formidable force.
It was a dark day in our history.
Perhaps the darkest, because on many levels it was the end of our civilization.
We were adopted, unwillingly, into the Shadow Empire.
Occasionally, during fitful nights when the blissful darkness of sleep refused to visit me, I thought back to those moments.
I found myself on the farm, in those final few days before the dark curtain descended on us.
Those moments of happiness and celebration were a total contrast to what happened immediately afterward.
It twisted every happy moment, making it dark and sinister.
Poisoning it.
I sometimes remembered things I’d long since forgotten, whispered secrets that I never shared with anybody.
Odd things, like a strong stranger turning up at our farm one day alongside a female alien that I’d had a crush on even at that young age.
But their features were lost to me.
Only their influence remained.
Their names were Froah and Nem.
Froah and Nem.
They were kind, good people.
They helped my parents bring in the harvest in exchange for food and board.
I had always felt comfortable around them.
Funny considering they were complete strangers.
I followed the pulsing light in my chest, a beacon much like a tracking system attached to an enemy vessel.
It was a part of my military training many others had failed.
Not every species assimilated by the Shadow shared their fated mate bond.
But the Qyah were one of them.
We were born linked to a creature somewhere in the galaxy, much the same as a natural-born Shadow.
And still, as I was not a native Shadow, I was regarded as a second-class citizen.
My fated mate was my ticket to first class.
I would be provided with better living accommodation and access to my mate anytime I wished.
I had crossed half the galaxy and crossed into an adjacent dimension to reach her.
My fated mate.
And once I had her, I would take her back to the Citadel.
There, she would be bred, claimed first by me, and then taken by other members of the Shadow Empire.
She would be used to breed more Shadows, making the Empire ever stronger.
It was a duty and an honor, and every fated mate should be pleased to carry it out.
There was only one wrinkle, and that was my opposite, birthed in this galaxy.
He was my twin but in all the ways I was dark, he was light.
Some say we shared a common ancestor and, unable to overcome the warring halves of their psyche, were forced to split in half.
One half in the light, the other in the dark.
The M’rora resided in this galaxy and we hunted for the same fated mate.
His mission was similar to mine, only he would take her back to his Citadel and exclusively mate with her in a ceremony called a “wedding.”
It was my job to ensure that didn’t happen.
I turned a corner and drew up to a large building with glass walls and a sloped dome roof.
Light classical music drifted out from the door as it swung back and forth.
Soft light blossomed from inside, making it look very appealing.
I checked the streets, looking for the enemy I knew was either there already or soon would be.
Content he wasn’t watching me, I shoved the door open and stepped inside.
I scanned the room, peering at each face one by one, searching for any sign of my M’rora twin.
Only once I was certain the coast was clear, did I find her.
She sat with her friend at a nearby table.
They both looked over at me, and that pulse in the center of my chest quickened along with the throbbing rhythm of my heart.
I raised a hand and placed it on the front breast pocket of my jacket.
I’d performed the movement so many times over the years that it happened unconsciously.
I relaxed and felt at ease, drawing from that little item in my pocket.
Peering into her eyes, I sensed I could see into her very soul.
My body shivered, quivering with curiosity.
Despite the training we received, you could never really know what this moment would feel like until you came face to face with it.
I approached an empty table, sat down, and continued staring at her.
Objectively speaking, she was pretty enough, with long brown hair and big eyes the irises of which glinted the color of remnark dark wood.
Her skin was pale and she wore a comfortable-looking but unflattering item of clothing that concealed whatever figure she may have underneath it.
Her eyes were red-rimmed and raw, her hair disheveled and dirty.
Not exactly the first impression I wished to have of my fated mate.
But her appearance was of little consequence.
The only thing that mattered was her ability to reproduce.
I approached the counter to buy a cup of coffee.
The hot drink smelled good, vaguely reminding me of squirnatch dirt after it’d been soaked in jirax blood.
That marked the successful assimilation of another alien species into the Shadow’s fold.
But that time, I had been part of the attacking force.
Few could stand against the Shadow.
In fact, it was only our twins, the M’rora who could.
They were as strong as us but with our vigorous breeding programs, we would soon tip the balance of power in our favor and dominate not just our universe, but theirs
