Kal had been right to stand down. His initial impulse was the right one. Not this sudden blitz into honor and chaos.
I’d seen what chaos looked like. I couldn’t remember my parents from my earliest years but I could remember the bombs and the explosions, the dust drizzling down, and the booms of tank fire.
And the screams.
They shook me most during the long nights and my foster parents had to run into my bedroom and hug me close. Nothing could distract me long from the nightmares. Alcohol was a welcome friend. So was partying. Numbing distractions from the horror.
I couldn’t let that happen again due to selfish inaction.
If I could go back and stop the conflict that claimed my parents’ lives, would I do it?
The answer was a surprisingly simple one.
I had no choice but to call the Changelings.
I raised the communicator to my face and jammed my finger on that green button.
And it was done.
I sat back on the bed and hung my head, placing it in my hands and waited for the inevitable. Still, a lingering part of me hoped Kal would achieve his goal and light that beacon, for whatever good it would do.
The shuttlecraft took a tight bend as we swung around the back of the huge host planet and used its gravity to slingshot us behind it on the far side.
Home. I was heading home. I would soon be in the land of milk and honey, back to the regular problems of a backward species. It felt strange to think of my people that way but after what I’d seen, was there any other way to think of us?
I was looking forward to heading back.
At least, I had been.
Right up until that moment last night when I tiptoed off to Kal’s room and forced myself inside. He’d been a willing victim, I told myself. We made love for hours, and it’d been the most magical experience of my life.
And then I betrayed him.
I shook my head to dispel the self-inflicted accusations. I needed to focus on the journey ahead. I didn’t need to worry about this stuff. It no longer had anything to do with me.
Except you betrayed him.
My fingers twirled around the thread poking out of a hole in my pants. I’d gathered my things quickly and jammed them in my bag. When the huge Changeling ship touched down, so big it cast a shadow over the entire town, I ran out to meet it.
I couldn’t stay in that castle another minute. The entire place reeked of him. I could never return there without it bringing me out in hot flushes.
And the fact I couldn’t think of him again saddened me more than anything else.
I couldn’t ever return there. Not even if I wanted to.
And I did want to.
But he would never forgive me. I would never forgive myself.
I tried not to think of him, tried not to see that broken look on his face when they dragged him into the main hall. His wrists and ankles were tied with metal chains and he fought to protect his friends and family—and me—from harm.
S’lec-Quos took a great deal of pleasure in revealing I had been the one to betray him.
And then the crushed look on Kal’s face when he realized it was true…
My legs shook and I could barely sit still on the shuttlecraft seat. I looked out the window to divert the road to ruin my emotions were heading down.
I couldn’t shake him free. It was like he was shackled to my mind.
That look of his broke my heart and the tears rolled down my cheeks.
I’m sorry. I’m sorry.
I’m so sorry.
I raised my chin and breathed deeply. I glanced ahead and noticed the Changeling pilots were busy surveying our location. It was a small mercy they hadn’t noticed me blubbing in the back. I wiped my eyes on a baggy sleeve.
Focus on the good, I told myself. Focus on the things I looked forward to.
I was excited about seeing my friends again. It wouldn’t be long before this whole thing was well and truly behind us. I thought about the story I would weave them. They would wake up from their pods, groggy with sleep the same way I had. I would pretend to wake from my pod too, I decided. It made explaining everything a lot easier.
How lucky they were, to wake up and feel like it had been nothing but a bad dream. I would have to live the rest of my life knowing there was more out there—a whole lot more—and not be able to share it with anyone.
Maybe I could tell Alice about it, under the guise it was a dream, so she might write about it. At least then it wouldn’t be forgotten.
The Changeling pilots made chittering noises to each other. It caught my attention because my translator strip should have made it audible to me. That meant it was either not working or…
The hairs stood up on the back of my neck.
They didn’t want me to hear what they were saying.
The pilot glanced back at me in the passenger seat. I’d taken the straps off the moment we escaped the atmosphere. It felt too confining. The look on the creature’s face was one I recognized. It looked like the sneer S’lec-Quos wore the day we agreed our deal.
And when the pilot brought his arm out, I acted instinctively and rushed forward. I seized the blaster pistol between us.
The jerk sent a red-hot bolt out the end that flew, as if in slow motion, into his co-pilot’s chest. He barely made a sound before his head dropped forward and he was gone.
The pilot peered at his dead friend. He drew his eyes to me. They blazed with liquid fury as he dropped the pistol and wrapped his hands around my neck.
“You bitch!” he wailed.
I fell
