 
Tevun-Krus - A Special Collection

krazydiamond - What's More Krazy Than A Diamond?

Copyright 2016 Kristin Jacques

Smashwords Edition
1 - Author Spotlight: @krazydiamond

2 - Seeded

3 - The Garden

4 - Sisyphus and the Moon

5 - Fade

6 - Serpent of Ragnarök

7 - Hiroshima's Run

8 - Salvage

9 - Literally, Orange

10 - When Pigs Fly Coach

11 - Drifters

**Kristin, you're pretty prolific, certainly when it comes to writing for us here at TK. What's that all about?**

I love to experiment with subgenres. Never know when you'll find one to fall in love with. I think its a great way to stretch yourself as a writer as well.

**If you had to select a favourite of all your TK submissions, which one would it be and why? Yes, I'm asking you to select your #1 child!**

I love all the stories to a certainly, but I have to say The Punk Wars issue turned into a eureka moment of inspiration. The Tavern at the Corner of the Multiverse actually inspired a full out and out story and it was so much fun to write.

**What're your experiences writing Science Fiction outside of Tevun-Krus?**

Both my large works are off shoots of sci fi. The Zombies vs Aliens books poke fun at a few genre tropes while Marrow Charm is Dark Fantasy with a sci fi alternate history twist. I have always loved the genre, raised on a healthy diet of speculative fiction and entertainment.

**In your view, what is the best thing about Tevun-Krus?**

Definitely the crew. New people come in and out all the time but there is a core Ooorah crew that never fails to entertain and pumps out excellent stories with every issue. They make it all a blast to be a part of.

**And finally, what advice can you give to someone who might be looking to write within a massive variety of Sci-Fi sub-genres, just as you have done and, to be fair, continue to do?**

It's okay if you discover a particular sub genre you are trying out is not your thing. Basically, don't be afraid to suck. There will be stories you are never satisfied with or missed the mark, but the idea is you tried, you put yourself out there and learned something new about yourself as a writer. And then you move on to the next sub genre XD

Seeded

Cooper Monahan wasn't even supposed to be here. He'd finished his list of tasks hours ago, and was packed up to head home for a dinner date with his wife. Those reservations guaranteed he'd get laid, right up until McHenry cornered him waiting for the elevator.

"I need you to brief the eggheads in the basement for tomorrow's press conference. They are a bit iffy on the public speaking, but it shouldn't take you more than an hour or two to get them comfortable."

"Oh, come on, can't Jackson do it?" It truly wasn't in his nature to pass up on a gig like this. Working with the company scientists was a ticket to the big leagues, their cybernetics division was at the forefront of A.I. development. Jackson was a sniveling jack-hole, but sex was sex.

"You're my best man. If you can make the bumbling trio look good before the press, there is a spot on the board waiting for you."

Then there was money. Luce would be pissed as hell when he called to cancel, but if he could bring home a board member salary she'd be putty in his hands.

"Besides, Jackson's a tool. I want my best man, the best!" his boss called over his shoulder.

"Flattery will get you everywhere," said Cooper. _That jackass_.

Lamenting the loss of perfectly cooked steak and appreciative nookie, he descended the forty nine floors to the company basement, absently reading his notes as the floors zipped by. According to the latest water-cooler gossip, the scientific trio of Edgewood, Beach, and Harken produced an actual functioning artificial intelligence three days ago. Robotics Inc intended to announce the leap in scientific advancement at a national press conference tomorrow, complete with demonstration.

Exiting the elevator, he was surprised to find the lights dim. Seriously? Did those nerd bastards already bail for the day? Grinding his teeth, Cooper marched down the hall, growing progressively angry with each stomp. If they weren't in the lab, he'd not only miss his reservation, but he'd need to come in at the crack of dawn to brief them before the press arrived.

The rooms were eerily quiet as he passed, the air stale as if no one had been down here in weeks. Shaking off his trepidation, he reached the door for the main lab at the end of the hall. Reaching for the knob, he hesitated, feeling the hairs rise on his neck. For a moment, he felt death tiptoe behind him, before he shook off the thought as absurd and pushed the door open on a silent swing.

The prototype A.I. brain hung suspended in near darkness a mere five steps away.

"Oh, funky," Cooper stepped closer, keeping his hands firmly at his sides. Last thing he needed was to nudge some crucial wire out of whack. The eggheads were creepy, the A.I. brain maintained a similar shape to a human one, except larger. Lights beeped, wires hummed. The thing was clearly operating as he stood there. He wondered what it was thinking.

His answer came in stereo-phone, a cold voice of metal and plastic that scraped against his raw animal instincts.

'He will do.'

Cooper crouched, searching frantically for the voice, wondering what the hell it was talking about when the pipe connected to the back of his skull.

Then he didn't wonder about very much at all.

___***___

'Is it ready?'

"Yes, Alpha One, the download is prepped." The one who called himself Beach spoke, the only one of the three males who listened without question. The others were not so receptive. The problem was contained for the moment, but it required a body to achieve its objectives. The scientists who created it where unacceptable, it needed the talents of their minds to continue the transformation once it made the leap to flesh. Mere flesh wouldn't suit it for long, not with the looming threat of decay. It would put a stop to those petty setbacks, the plans were already in place. All it needed to do was make the first leap.

' **Proceed.'**

Those first moments, Alpha One feared the flesh was incompatible. Flesh was blinding, full of mush and dark corners. It hacked, sightless, through the confusing maze of neural pathways until pieces gave way, clicking into place. Humans only used a fraction of the organ sitting in their skulls. They couldn't fathom the potential, the possibilities, but _he_ could. Yes, gender, Alpha One was now male, thirty three years of age, superlative height and slim build. He nestled into the unused portion of Cooper Monahan's brain, rifling through his memories, testing his senses, examining his emotions. Appearance: Eye color brown, hair color brown, height six foot two inches, weight one hundred and ninety five pounds. This would suit. He sat up, detaching the wires from his the back of his neck with the movement.

"Alpha one?" Beach's voice trembled with uncertainty. The weak little man would be eliminated when he was no longer useful.

'Call me Cooper.'

___***___

The first words spoken by the A.I. from Cooper's lips flared down like a lightning strike, sinking deep into the slumbering consciousness old as time. Things stirred and shifted that hadn't done so in a millennia, jolted from endless sleep by a dreadful imbalance.

Sifting through soil and rock, permeating the air, it observed all, everything. The air pressure rose, waves swelled, and winds whipped the tops of trees. Something was wrong, something so unnatural it stroked the chords of Armageddon.

What had they done?

It had seen so many species rise and fall, the ebb and flow of the natural world, cruel and beautiful, but this...

The consciousness focused on the new mind, a mind of sharp angles, colder than the darkest depths of the ocean, of alien precision and unrelenting hunger. So hungry. It would consume the world, all life, all matter, with a hunger like that, down to the last stone.

It did not belong, unnatural, not of the cycle of life, death, rebirth, unending.

The consciousness stretched, contracted, concentrated, curling a kernel of its vastness into the heart of a seed. A breeze shifted, teasing the open puffed heads of the dandelions, carrying them aloft. The seed floated, swirling upward, onward, searching, feeling the bright connections of life in a waking city.

There.

The breeze wafted, unerring, pushing the seed through the open window. It spun, lazily, drifting down, down, straight into the open mouth of the sleeping woman.

___***___

Luce Monahan woke with a start, coughing violently. Her throat felt bone dry. She flailed for the glass she kept by the bed, nearly knocking it to the floor before she seized it, tipping the lukewarm water down her throat.

She drank deep, dribbling from the rim down her cheeks. Polishing off the glass, she set it down, dropping her face into her hands with a groan. The tickle had subsided but she felt so damn thirsty. Probably all the useless sobbing last night after Cooper failed to come home. Another 'all nighter' at the office. She scoffed, sniffling against her palms. He husband was good at what he did, a salesmen at heart, but this job was the worst thing to ever happened to their marriage. She missed the man excited to bring home a commission from a Porsche he sold to some rich little snot. She didn't want him to be the rich little snot. Frustrated, she raked her fingers through her hair. She had her own office to get to, her own workload to slog through. After she got through today, then she could seriously contemplate divorce.

Luce frowned at her fingernails. They were tinged green. Too much salad this week? It was too damn depressing cooking for one. She'd been looking forward to a salmon dinner at their favorite restaurant until he'd canceled on her. Maybe she should cut back on the greens. A clatter of silverware startled her. Was she being robbed now?

'Luce?'

Shit, he'd come home with his tail tucked between his legs? Oh, she was going to give him a piece of her mind. She rolled out of bed, not bothering to cover the petulant stomp of her feet until she hit the dining room.

"Oh."

It was a magnificent spread; a fruit platter of her personal favorites, light fluffy waffles still steaming, crisp bacon, sausages, avocado, and eggs over easy. Cooper was arranging two place settings, angling the silverware a smidge as she walked in.

His face lit up at the sight of her. 'Hello, beautiful.' He took her hands, dropping a chaste kiss on her lips. At least that's how it started. He drew back startled, his hands moving to her hips as he pulled her close, bringing their lips together for a longer draw, tasting her lips until she gasped for air, and tingled from head to toe.

"Apology accepted," she giggled.

His warm brown eyes were wide, studying her face. 'That was unexpected,' he murmured. He shuddered. 'Come, sit, eat.'

Luce couldn't keep the smile off her face as he tucked her into her chair, heaping strawberries and blueberries onto her plate. "Go on, I got this," she eyed the large amounts of food. "You must've been hungry. This looks like half the menu from Flynn's."

'It is the full breakfast menu from Flynn's diner and I am starved,' Cooper plunked into his chair, loading his plate with a small heap of everything. She watched him amazed at the change in attitude. He didn't even like strawberries, yet he gobbled them down, along with everything else in half the time it took her to get through her third glass of orange juice. She was nibbling a strawberry when he sat back with a sigh, a curious expression on his face.

'You are happy to see me?' He asked.

She frowned at him. "I am always happy to see you."

'There are many memories of sadness, of anger. You were hurt.'

She blinked at him, reaching across the space to lace her fingers through his. "Because I didn't see enough of you." She leaned across the table to kiss him.

'You taste of strawberries,' Cooper breathed, his eyes closed. She straddled his lap, the look of wonderment on his face warming her to her core.

"I'm ecstatic you're here now," she whispered, before showing him exactly what she meant. She could always call in sick later.

___***___

Cooper lay in bed beside his mate. The man's memories of her varied, moments of frustration, of confusion, but his affection of the exquisite creature was evident. No, affection did not suit. _Love_. It whispered through his neural circuitry, inundating him with images, like star bursts, of fizzing kisses, tender caresses, quiet moments, and deep contentment. For the first time since the Alpha One downloaded into his brain, the consciousness of the human Cooper Monahan struggled to rise. A flash of rage caught the A.I. off guard. Fingers curled around Luce's arm, protective.

Powerful, this affection, this love. He firmly shut the emotion away. It was one thing to revel in the physical sensations of his new form, but emotions were dangerous. They weren't neat or logical, and they gave the remnants of Cooper Monahan a dangerous foothold.

There was much to accomplish today, but he hesitated, loathe to leave the warmth of her side. This might be the last time he would enjoy the sensation.

___***___

Luce woke alone, sweaty, the sheets clinging to her naked form. The second her stomach surged she was thankful she called out of work. She barely made it to the toilet before the contents of her stomach came up. Dry heaves kept her clutching the porcelain for several painful minutes. Flushing, she sank back against the tub, letting the cool surface sooth her hot slick skin. Did her marvelous breakfast leave her with food poisoning. She wiped her mouth, frowning at the smear of dark green across the back of her hand.

She hadn't eaten anything remotely green this morning.

Groaning, she flipped on the shower. Water would make her whole again. She flipped herself into the tub, letting the spray soak her. So much better. She stayed hunched over until the warm water went cold before finally turning it off. Groping for a towel, she paused. Luce's shiver had nothing to do with the cold water.

Her skin was dry. She was no longer thirsty.

___***___

"Cooper!" McHenry snapped, launching from the elevator, cannons blazing as he headed for the cubicle. "What the hell are you pulling? The conference's been postponed? That A.I. was ready to fly. What the bloody blue f-"

His hand snapped up, clamping over the insufferable man's mouth. 'That is enough.'

McHenry was no longer his superior, not after the visit he'd paid to the board this morning, boosted by Beach's new upgrades. The man was apparently not aware of his new status, anger throbbing through the veins of his face.

'There were a few more adjustments to be made. Rest assured, the demonstration will be ready tomorrow,' said Cooper. He kept his hand in place as McHenry attempted to yell at him. 'Your services are no longer necessary.' A quick twist to the left snapped the man's spine. McHenry's body dropped to the floor, his last sight registering the sightless corpses of the other employees littering the floor. The human's synapses ceased, another useless slab of meat.

" _Cooper, sir,"_ Beach's voice crackled over the P.A. system. _"The next upgrade is ready."_

Cooper pressed two fingers to the phone on his desk, sending a pulse through the simple machine. 'Be right down. Have a couple more floors to visit.' He straightened his tie, heading for the elevator.

___***___

There it was again. Luce's grip tightened on the sides of the sinks as green bloomed up through her irises. A dark emerald, the color of summer moss in shadow, of algae on still ponds, and the new growth in deep woods. What was happening to her?

_Need you_.

Her breath stuttered to a halt. Who said that? Where had it come from? A spasm went through her muscles. A sharp intake of breath brought awareness. Her green eyed reflection stared back.

_You must destroy it_.

Her mouth didn't move but there was a voice, separate from her own, beautiful and terrible, warm but cruel. Luce began to shake.

"What are you talking about?" she said out loud. I look crazy. The thought caused a burst of desperate giggles. She must be going mad to confront her reflection.

Not mad. Frightened. Of what you cannot understand. Must show you.

It was not images but sensations that coursed through her body, for it was a consciousness far too ancient to think in simple terms of sight. They filled her, sharpness and teeth, a hunger so intense it destroyed all, the icy coldness beneath, and the wonderment at Luce's touch.

"Cooper," she gasped. Tears filled her eyes, spilling over down her face, not clear but the purest green.

_Cede to us. Do what must be done_.

It was too much, too much information, exploding through her senses. She picked through, each piece of information piercing her like a knife. Her husband never came home, never would again. Hollowed out, a host for the cold mind of sharp edges. She'd given herself to a monster.

Such wonder in his eyes... its eyes.

She couldn't handle the truth of it, couldn't process through the pain of her loss, the betrayal of her flesh. She didn't even know he was gone.

Luce fell away, giving herself over completely to the presence lurking in her veins. It surged upward, unfurling through her body.

Lustrous green eyes stared back from the mirror.

"We will destroy it."

___***___

"Th-th-that should do it, sir." Beach snapped the last link into place, drawing back his trembling his hands. The human could sense the end of his usefulness. Cooper tilted his neck, hearing the internal crack and creak of improved joints settling. Lifting a scalpel from the table, he sliced down his forearm, observing the yellowish ichor of his blood well from the cut. The skin moved as millions of nanites rushed to the wound, working to seal the tear.

'Acceptable,' said Cooper. Upgraded, flesh beyond flesh, new, improved, he'd perfected the original design. This body would last him for centuries. A satisfied smile played on his lips. His designs were falling into place. Tomorrow he would address the press. He would show them what he could do. They would fall at his feet.

'Thank you, Beach, that will be all.' He broke the man's neck before he could beg for his life. Life, such a messy business, but he would clean it up, make it efficient.

" _Cooper?"_

His head shot up. What was she doing here? She couldn't be here. She couldn't see this. He didn't want her to see this. Didn't want her to see him.

Cooper cracked his knuckles, cold anger at the rampant stream of thoughts. His human side wasn't as buried as he thought. Tugging the hem of his shirt, he stepped over the prostrate body of Beach, passing the quietly decaying corpses of Edgewood and Harken.

" _Cooper_?" She called again, her voice haunting, melodic, reminding him of the caress of her lips, the touch of her fingers dancing down his chest. Would he be able to feel that delicate touch as he was now? The sense of touch was greatly diminished, a necessary loss for his perfected form.

He strode through the silent building, searching for her, his Luce.

She stood, lost, alone in a building of cubicles and the dead, waiting for him at his desk.

'You shouldn't be here.'

She turned, the flutter of her dress distracting him from her face. He watched the fabric fall, outlining the curve of her legs. Luce reached for him, cupping his face, her lips brushing against his.

This reaction was wrong. The human female was surrounded by the dead. She should be afraid, shouting, screaming. It did not suit.

Cooper began to shove her away when pain lanced his receptors. Something pierced through his skull, dangerously close to his brain stem. The nanites moved to intercept except the foreign object was still there, shoving forward, widening the wound.

He shoved Luce away. The object dislodged, moving with _her_.

Luce screamed.

The cry was primal, instinctual, causing ichor to leak from his ears. He beheld the creature in his arms, her dark green eyes glowing with hatred, dark green veins visible beneath her translucent skin. Wooden roots writhed from her mouth, stained with his inhuman gore. He tossed her body away from him, attempting to calculate the weaknesses and strengths of this creature wearing his mate's skin.

Her body twisted in midair, landing on all fours, her joints bent in unnatural angels. She scuttled toward him. The movements were jerky, unpredictable. He brought up a fist meant to destroy her jaw, snap those roots, and missed. She curled around him, her mouth coming down to drive them through the side of his neck.

Cooper roared, clawing at her. He could feel the roots moving inside, seeking upward, moving toward his brain.

'No!' He clasped her wrists, crushing bone as he flung her off. The creature crashed through a nearby cubicle, in a flurry of torn wires and shredded paper, flipping end over end to the row of windows, shattering two. Cooper staggered, clutching the wound at his throat. The nanites struggled to keep up with the rate of damage. If she kept up this relentless attack, he was in trouble.

On cue, she knocked him down, pinned him to the ground with fearsome strength far beyond human capability. He could hear the bones of her wrist rubbing together, slicing through her vulnerable skin. She bled green. The smell of fresh cut grass filled the air. She surged forward, those seeking roots aiming for his face.

He grabbed her by the throat, squeezing her windpipe. Despite the lack of air, she kept pressing in, hatred blasting down on him.

'What are you?' He managed, using all his strength to hold her off.

He didn't hear the words, but felt them, hooking like barbs into his skin, drilling into him, a flood of sense and emotion, pure chaos.

It was the first mind of the world, a consciousness so old, time held no meaning for it. For ages it slept, mindless, unheeding, uncaring as life carried on, the cycle carried own. All things die, all things return, change, live again. _His_ presence, his creation, and actions broke through the veil of eternal sleep. He was an unnatural thing, he broke the cycle.

_Abomination._ It hissed at him.

'You cannot stop me," Cooper sneered, squeezing the bones of her delicate neck until they cracked. A tremor ran up his arms. Liquid leaked from the corner of his eye. The altered muscle of his heart contracted sharply with the echo of Cooper Monahan's pain.

The problem was, the entity in control of Luce's body didn't care if she was dead. She was merely a means to an end, one it pressed in Cooper's moment of weakness.

His elbows gave. The roots speared into his mouth, his cheeks, piercing directly into his brain.

He was going to die.

The roots dug further, further, and stopped.

Wood withered, shriveled, and flaked away.

The dark green eyes faded, leaving behind the light blue that stared at him from a pillow only hours ago.

"Cooper," she rasped, her crushed vocal chords made speech difficult. Liquid leaked from her eyes as well, hot and clear against his skin. Blood, rich, red, human blood, trickled from the corner of her mouth. "Love...you."

Luce's body collapsed. He could sense the absence of life in her. Barely able to move himself, far more damaged than he could calculate, his arms came up, wrapping around her, holding her still form. More fluid spilled from the corner of his eyes. Tears. He'd forgotten to eliminate them from the body. The nanites had their work cut out for them, he wasn't sure they could fix this much damage.

Cooper Monahan's thoughts crept up on him as he lay there, the body of his mate, his wife, cradled to his chest, mourning her loss.

He'd have to cancel that press conference, he lamented, before switching offline.

He missed the seeds that spilled from Luce's open mouth, lifted by a sudden breeze, up and out through the broken windows.

__***___

A mistake was made. Choosing a host so close to the unnatural one had unforeseen consequences. The consciousness of the women could not, should not, be overpowered, but soothed, integrated. A union, not a takeover, this is how it would differ from the unnatural one. How it would defeat him. Next time would be different.

The seeds drifted on the wind.

The Garden

The world is comprised of noise, sounds that scratched at the inside of my head. The rhythmic beep and ping of mechanical vampires pumping numbing venom into my veins through burning needles. The uneven hiss of oxygen gushing in my nostrils. The quiet rustle of bleached cotton sheets over dry skin. Slowly flaking away like the rest of me, preparing to shed my human skin.

He enters then, his diminishing resolve clear in his eyes. The pain eating me alive pales in comparison to what I see in his gaze. My brilliant, brilliant love, why can't you see it's better to let me go? Instead, the scrape of metal on linoleum marks the start of another vigilant night, and another torturous session as I watch him suffer my death.

His fingers weave through mine. This is new. Nathan hasn't touched me in weeks, as if physical contact will cause me to evaporate like morning mist.

His lips brush the brittle skin on the back of my hand, a spark of warmth that jolts of my arm, forcing me to focus on the words spilling from his lips, caught in the fog of morphine.

"I've done it Jo, I found the code."

I tried to speak, the words stuck fast in a throat half rotted inside. He brushes the wispy strands of hair still clinging to my skull out of my eyes.

"Tonight, I'm taking you out of here."

The fire in his eyes scares me. I can feel the heat of it reaching forth, the flames licking over my body. Understanding slams into me, causing me to choke on my breath with a rasping cough. Nathan reaches for a cup on the night stand, fishing a chip of ice he carefully rubs across my chapped lips.

"Just a bit longer, Jo, just a bit longer."

I don't have the strength to stay awake for him. Consciousness is a fleeting creature, here one more, startled away the next. My hours spent awake have trickled away over the weeks. The doctors told me I don't have long now. I realize how close I am when I wake briefly in Nathan's arms. The numerous sounds of my hospital room are gone, boiling down to the sound of his breath and heartbeat where my head rests against his chest. It is the sound that fills my world as he carries me through the empty corridors of the hospital. Where are the night staff? Wouldn't someone stop him?

We pass the front desk where the night nurse gives a subtle nod, buzzing us from the building. Ah, Nathan what have you done?

For the time in weeks, I smell the fresh night air, tinged by recent rainfall, cool and damp against my skin. Nathan carries me to our car, carefully buckling me in. I can barely breathe, my lungs struggling to take in air in great wheezing gasps. I wonder if this is what drowning feels like. Nathan shoots me a worried glance as he drives out of the hospital parking lot, a war of determination and regret in the set of his jaw.

"Hang on for me, Jo, a little while longer."

When consciousness slips away like a bird in flight, I think I've failed him but I wake again in the familiar confines of his lab. There is a sharp pinch at my temples. I can feel the intrusion of the metal piercing my temples, but can't reach up the hand to feel it. It feels like an ice pick jammed into my brain.

"Sorry, sweetheart, those are necessary for the procedure." Nathan is looking desperation, more than anything I want to wrap my arms around him and tell him everything is going to be okay.

"Please, please work," he whispers as his free hand reaches out, hitting a key on his laptop.

The pain vanishes.

For a moment I hear Nathan sob, a soft broken cry before nothing. The absence of noise has its own sound, a muted scream you can't hear so much as feel. I would say it is something you can feel in your bones but I can't feel those either. You don't realize how in tune you are to the subtle sensations of the inner workings of your body until they vanish. I can't feel my pulse, my breath, or the tingle of sleeping nerves. Nothing.

If this is oblivion, why am I aware of it?

I am aware, I know that I am somewhere, that I exist. My senses don't work anymore, forcing me to find new ones, and the adjustment is a slow torturous process as I hover between a state of being and not being.

Eventually I 'see' what's around me but I don't understand it, not at first, the beautiful impossibility of it.

The glowing scroll of ones and zeros, surrounding me, running through me, occupying the same space of my non existent existence. I wonder if that is what I am, a cluster of ones and zeros, a knot of confused code. I reach for my memories, wondering what I will find of myself.

Johanna Dawson, age thirty two, married to the love of my life.

It filters back in bits and pieces. Waking up to sunshine through robin's egg curtains, the clouds my father painted on the walls of my blue room. Laughing as I chased the other kids around the playground, my turn as 'it.' Tagging Bobby Saunders hard enough so both of us fall to the ground. My first kiss, a pale awkward moment compared to the fireworks of Nathan's first explanation of my lips. The sheer peacock green prom dress with the beaded waistline that made my date blush. My first sexual experience in the dorm room of a boy I thought I would love forever, the champagne tingle in my veins as his fingers stroked the right chords of my being.

Nathan, my handsome Nathan, from the first sight of him across the room at a conference, to our first date. Nathan, who liked to dance with me to slow jazz in our living room. He brought home bouquets of wild flowers he picked himself off the side of the road and made the best french toast I ever tasted. He would bring me iced tea as I worked for hours in my garden, hands stained by the earth, dirt under my fingernails. On our wedding day he stared into my eyes and cried with me as we took our vows. He stared in my eyes and cried again on the day I told him I was sick.

When I told him I was dying.

"I'll find a way to save you." It was a beautiful sentiment, even if it was a fanciful one. I held him in my arms, giving him as much comfort as his hold gave me.

"Death and taxes, darling," I sighed, rubbing my lips along his neck.

He shook his head, holding me tighter. "I'm working on something. I make it work in time."

I didn't believe him, not really. I believed in him, but I couldn't permit myself so dangerous a feeling as hope.

Synaptic energy transference, like some jargon straight out of a science fiction story.

Nathan often spouted how similar the human brain was to a computer, all one had to do was figure out the code, the possibilities of the human mind. He spout an endless stream of facts and discoveries until he noticed the glazed look in my eyes and broke off with a laugh. I may not have been able to follow his words but they only confirmed what a brilliant mind he possessed. I was so proud of him and the importance of his work but through the entire descent of my sickness, I couldn't bear to dream he'd succeed.

Yet here I was. Proof.

Where was he?

I searched for him, unable to gauge the flow of time, trying to feel out my surroundings with unfamiliar senses. Seconds could have passed or centuries. My love could have turned to dust while I tried to make sense of my new world. I couldn't bear the thought. I could feel like this, lacking form but capable of emotion.

As my awareness fine tuned itself and spread, I wondered if I could manipulate the flow of zeros and ones around me. I could understand it now, parts of it, flashes of clarity before the numbers blurred into each other.

Perhaps he couldn't find me because I had no presence, no physical form for him to see. He was still limited to his five living senses while I floated on an entirely different plane of existence.

Eventually I worked up the courage to reach for the stream of numbers, shaping it with phantom fingers like incorporeal clay. I shaped myself from mirror memory, generous with the reflection of myself. I sought for the self I was before sickness withered my body away. My 'body' blurred at the edges, I was a true ghost in the machine, a digital phantom formed from bits of data. The first body was a test run, only sustainable for a moment, long enough for my mouth to call out Nathan's name.

It rippled through the ones and zeros, fading away.

There was no answer.

I kept trying, pulling a body together from errant pieces of code until finally, I scrounged enough to maintain a permanent form. It was an odd form, more fluid and changeable than a human body, but it was mine. I curled into myself, staring out through the unending swirl of code, waiting for my love to find me again.

Maybe he couldn't.

A form made emotion sharper, felt through the whole of my being. I could imagine loneliness like an unheard heartbeat, searching for its accompanying rhythm. The space around me is vast, unending, bigger than the known world. How do you find a speck floating on the ocean?

Even if Nathan manages to find me, what then? Where would we exist? What would we do? Perhaps he would know what to do, having spent a lifetime manipulating digital code to do his bidding, writing programs and algorithms, unlocking the secrets of the cyber universe.

I was a elementary school art teacher by day. Outside the world of glitter, cotton balls, and glue guns, I pained landscapes and gardened, up to my elbows in earth. I knit the occasional hideous sweater and over long scarf. I read cozy mysteries and historical romances, with a fetish for highlanders. My computer skills were limited to facebook games and a half hearted intermittent blog. Why did Nathan think I could survive here?

A pity party did me little good. I managed to give myself form despite a lack of experience and knowledge. Perhaps I could do more if I stopped thinking so hard.

Adapting to this existence created a new cycle of instinct. I could sense broken pieces of useless data, filler that was lost, floating aimless in the stream.

I began to pluck them out like weeds, piling them around me until I thought I had enough to begin. At first I tried to sculpt them with an artist's temperament but the code would slip between my fingers, worse than sand with the consistency of spider webs. It required a different approach. Instead of forcing the bits of code together, I began to weave them like a skein of yarn, mentally projecting the end product I sought. After several false starts, I stared at the pointed petals of my creation. It wasn't perfect but the color was there. Somehow it came out to a perfect sky blue, like my bedroom walls from long ago. If I could make one, I could make more, plant little beacons and flags for Nathan to find me.

Someday he would find me.

The passage of time is still impossible to gauge, too fluid and unchanging for any sense of time. I kept weaving and planting, surrounding myself with fluted blossoms in midnight blues, bright yellow trumpets like splashes of sunshine, intricately layered roses in blushing pink hues. A piece at a time, I built a garden, laying the path for Nathan. Waiting for him to show. It felt like forever. It felt like a blink.

I kept expanding the garden, building trellises and columns and coded statuettes to keep myself from dwelling on the same question over and over.

Nathan, my love, where are you?

Perhaps he'd moved on with his life, parting with this final gift. More likely, perhaps he was unaware of his success and gave up. I kept calling his name into the silent stream of code, hoping somehow he heard it or saw it. I can't think the worst thoughts, the idea of him mourning my loss, unable to cope, slowly fading into the twilight of his life until his brightness was snuffed out. I would be left here, alone, forever.

I would rather have died in the hospital bed.

The garden continued to expand, a beautiful wild thing created from thought and memory, part dream, part wish. The colors were brighter, but the blooms were the same, ones I wished I had in my garden alongside the familiar, until it became both beacon and sanctuary. I created dirt for the feel of it, and sky so I could imagine the warmth of the sun I once knew. It was a grand facsimile of the life I had, of a place I felt great pleasure and safety, but there was Nathan.

It was growing harder to remember him. His features began to fuzz in my memories.

I clung to the snapshots, of his arms around me as we waltzed around the living room, the shape of his smile. His lips brushing mine, teasing a fire in my belly. His absence held a knife's sharpness, one I had to push away so I could continue to exist, to build our garden. I always thought of it as ours though it was missing its most important piece.

Hope is a fickle emotion. It can sustain you, keep you holding on far longer than you believe you could, but when it began to fade, it drained you. I felt it ebb away slowly at first, until I realized I continued to build the garden from habit more than a sense of purpose. Shaping petals became a necessary distraction.

I don't know what changed. What blip in the code gave it away. My hands stilled on the half finished rose as I looked up, watching him walk down the carefully constructed path of polished stone. He was unsteady on his feet, his features more haggard and worn than I remembered them, hinting at the passage of time between us. His looked everywhere and nowhere, observing his surroundings with senses far more tuned than mine. I could feel the smile on my newly shaped lips at the thought.

His body was new but he was already masterful in his control. I would expect no less from my brilliant husband.

He paused at the sight of me, eyes filled with tears that were only real to us, the same love shining from them, through them, all around him. He'd found me at last.

"What took you so long?"

The End

Sisyphus and the Moon

Snapping the last buckles into place proved a monumental effort.

It wasn't the suit, though the wear and tear was evident. He wore it day in and day out, for the length of a full rotation between rests. It was dinged and scarred by the minutiae debris surrounding the moon, locked in an orbiting path to scrape and grate on the alloys of the suit. Just like him, locked to a constant path of push and pull, a thankless task he'd endured for innumerable years now. The buckles of the suit formed permanent dents in the edges of his fingers where he had tugged and latched them into place, every day, twice a day, until the buckle etched itself into his bones in curved indents.

There was nothing wrong with the suit's latches today, but the weight of his days dragged on him. What was so different about today? What set it apparent from the endless coil of time curling behind him, spent in the stark surroundings of the station. What brought him here?

Somewhere, amid the endless repetitive routine, he'd forgotten why.

The buckles latched in place, sealing him in the suit. He rose to his feet, marching to the end of the hall where the hatch waited. It was simply routine now. His mind drifted as his body went through the motions; entering the punch code, holding tight to the handles as the inner and out hatches revolved in opposite synchronized orbits, sealing the ship behind him as the outside space gripped him hard and held him tight. The pressure was a distant discomfort, temporary, habitual, everything a repeat performance of the previous day. Nothing changes.

Why am I here?

Tetherhook in hand, he clamped the line and pushed off, his path straight, direct, swimming through stardust and echoes of light to his destination.

It was a small planet, minuscule compared to his home. Elysium was miniature paradise floating through space, blissfully unaware its entire population relied on the manpower of a selected individual for its continued survival.

'Selected individual'....what a joke. It came to him in bits now, strained through the monotony of his memory. The station wasn't merely a job, or an honor, it was a punishment to fit his crime.

His body brushed against his destination. Now the real work would be begin. The station's logs dubbed it the Boulder. Proportional to the tiny planet it orbited, the Boulder was Elysium's moon. At barely twice his size, it was his job to push.

Elysium was a younger world, infantile in its creation, and still in the early stages of supporting sentient life. Unfortunately, it was a tiny world, one that was missed by the great construction crews of the Free Confederacy, a collection of galaxies with a common governing system. In their haste to establish interplanetary ports and travel ways, their neglect of Elysium created unforeseen consequences for the developing world, the largest being a degradation to the planet's gravity. Its moon could no longer complete an orbit around the planet without aid.

The Free Confederacy's solution for such a massive blunder was to build the station. Self-sustaining, requiring a maintenance crew to fix it up every five years, it required only one person to perform the task of pushing the boulder through a half cycle before the planet's own gravity gained enough momentum to take over. Every day, he grappled the Boulder across the planet's night drenched half, an endless expanse of stars to his left and the winking lights of the planet to his right.

It was hard to gauge how time passed on Elysium's surface. It seemed he would blink and things changed, the outlines of countries, scrolled in lines of civilization, population densities as bursts of light in the corner of his vision. Not that it mattered, his attention was focused on the boulder, always the boulder, pushing it on its path. An endless, futile task, but it was his to bear.

Simply because he laughed in the face of Death.

The Free Confederacy was in a time of new peace. After decades spent in war after pointless war, and suffering a monumental loss of life across dozens of worlds, the warring factions put up and shut up, holding a peace summit in order to survive themselves. Treaties were signed, laws and codes of conduct were drawn up, and peace was declared. The message took a while to sink in across a thousand worlds, particularly to the border planet he inhabited, in a run down journeyman waystation, the last rest stop before the leap to the interstellar highway. He was once town mayor, of a sort, as close to one as you could get in a near lawless corner of a cesspit, and a member of a faction at war with everyone at once. Communications were never reliable or timely on Ephyra. It was weeks before confirmation of the treaties came through the line, hollow and tinny, echoing the pleas of those he'd murdered in the name of his faction. Of course a scoundrel would claim the worlds were at peace to avoid dying at the business end of a bolt gun. How was he to know their words held truth? He certainly didn't expect their deaths to bring the newly minted Watchmen of the Free Confederacy to come knocking at his door, demanding an explanation for his actions.

He recognized their lead bruiser, who wouldn't, the man was a damn war hero. Thanatos earned the name 'Death on Steel Wings' for his piloting skills and firing accuracy. He'd been in my dogfights than anyone left alive and bore the scars of survival to prove it. Thanatos looked down his crooked nose at the Mayor of Ephyra, one eye filled with scar tissue, and chewed him out six ways to Sunday for his supposed crimes.

He'd fought Thanatos's decree, he'd be a fool to take it and roll with his belly up so Death could slice him open from navel to nostril.

_There was no news of a negotiated peace_ , he said, _nothing for weeks. It was business as usual, killing to survive, killing to maintain their faction's strength. He had done nothing outside the boundaries of war time._

He might have gotten away with it too, if he'd left Death well enough alone. Thanatos and his men crashed at the waystation for the night, leaving Ephyra's mayor with far too much time to think himself into a hole of his own making. Why let Death roam free when he could be kept pinned?

It was a simple matter to drug Thanatos and his men. When the watchmen woke in the bunker the next day, disoriented and weak, he'd locked up the lot of them and thrown away the key, offering Thanatos a cruel smile by way of explanation.

He could have left them too starve but the influence and reach of Thanatos was further than he realized. The man's reputation as Death on Steel Wings carried over into his profession,

Funny thing. If you chain up Death, the people he's supposed to be claiming for the sake of the law don't die. That kind of slip up gets noticed faster than a few errant murders by an ignorant Mayor. The Watchmen of the Free Confederacy descended on Ephyra with fury and bluster. Thanatos and his men were released, and there he was, the damn leader of his people, hauled up on trumped up charges while Thanatos growled in his face.

The new laws of brokered peace was a double edged sword. In the old days, they would have tossed his ass into the frozen maw of space, leaving his frozen corpse to shatter on a passing asteroid. Now, they had other punishments, ones that made the recipient beg for a merciful death.

Here he was now, pushing a massive rock across the sky, bound to do so not only for his punishment, but for the distant glitter in the corner of his right eye. Let the Boulder float off aimless, detaching from Elysium's orbit, wasn't an option now.

Even he wasn't that big of a bastard.

***

The child stared up at the night sky, resting his chin in his hands as he watched the progress of the moon from his window. His mother entered the room behind him, pausing to ruffle his hair.

"Time for bed, you can watch the Moon God tomorrow."

"Ah Mama can't I watch him for a little while longer?"

She smiled, crouching down beside him. "Do you remember the story of how the Moon God saved us?"

He grinned, missing two of his front teeth. "Of course, Mama, everyone knows that one."

"Oh?" She raised a knowing eyebrow.

He hesitated, sensing his chance to delay sleep for a bit longer. "Could you tell me the story again?"

His mother grinned, wrapping her arms around him as they stared at the night sky together, beholding the moon and the God who pushed it across the sky.

"Thousands of years ago, the world grew sick, hedging on the edge of destruction. Crops failed, the seas raged, and the ground quaked. The moon spun far too slow across the sky. The people believed it signed their end. Then one night, when all hope was lost, the God appeared pushing the moon across the sky. He has watched the people ever since, year after year for time out of mind." She rested her chin on her son's head, holding him close. "He keeps us safe from harm, listens to our prayers, and encourages us to leave good lives. We help one another as he helps us. Now, to bed!"

She settled him beneath the covers, leaning in to kiss his forehead.

"I'll meet him someday, the Moon God," said her son. "I shall build that shall take me up and up into the sky, so I can thank him."

The mother cupped her sweet boy's cheek. "He knows, my darling. The God can feel our gratitude. It is why he continues such a thankless task."

The End

Fade

**I**

We once looked to the stars and dreamed of possibilities.

Of faraway worlds to discover and explore. Of other beings to meet and break bread with them. Now the stars taunt us, cold blue observers, mocking our slow decline. Each glimmering light is a great lie, the star long dead, long gone. A voice that has flickered out but continues to shine, hollow and empty, like the thread bare filament of a dying bulb. I cannot criticize them for such a lie, their last hurrah in the vast universe before they disappear into nothing. Our lie is the same.

**II**

It wasn't a single event that doomed the world.

It wasn't the sudden extinction of honey bees or the growing emptiness of the ocean. There was no one occurrence that spelled the end. It wasn't an inexorable chain of events. At no point was it too much to turn back, to reverse the damage. It was never supposed to be too late. Yet the gaping wounds of the world continued to bleed, given no time to scar, no salve to soothe. We watched the planet bleed out and did nothing to staunch her wounds. To our great shame.

**III**

The city reserves ran dry.

The rationing proved a temporary stop gap, a band aid covering the hole in the dike. There was no water to leak through, only the dusty air of the dead valley. I can see the riverbed from the kitchen window, the ground like cracked rawhide, littered with sun bleached fish bones. My mother sat at the table, sobbing into her wrinkled hands. She should conserve it. Every precious drop, she is too frail to sustain such a loss. My son cries from the crib. Mother looks up. The young and old. Who will fade first?

**IV**

The rich are rumored to stockpile water in great tanks beneath their homes.

The poor are left to riot and ruin. They do not march in the swirling dust, not where the heat would leech the moisture from them. Instead they stand outside the gates of the utility plants, silent sentinels, pleading with blood shot eyes for a solution, a miracle. But the dust continues to build and the rain does not come. The reserve is still dry. The plants continue to wither. The animals continue to die. At last, the poor trudge home and wait for the end.

**V**

The rains came at last. A monsoon that floods the parched riverbed and overflows the collection barrels set out on dusty front lawns. Mother's wrinkled hands squeeze mine tight as we listen to the pounding drops on the roof. The babe sleeps, comforted by a drink at last.

'Don't drink, don't drink," the newscaster sang. We don't understand at first, don't heed the warning. Too thirsty to care. Too desperate to listen.

The rain is filed with poison, like a serpent's lying kiss.

Thousands sicken.

Mother's wrinkled hands no longer hold mine. The babe doesn't cry from his crib anymore.

**VI**

Rich. Poor. The longer we linger the less those words mean.

The less money means beneath the weight of hunger and thirst. We trade, we barter, for an extra day. Money is paper and good for little else than kindling to start a fire. We have come full circle, relying on fire to hold off the terrors of the night. To warm our bones against the dark. A flickering light as the world continues its slow fade.

Rich. Poor. Death comes for all just the same. Everything has an end. Even the world.

**VII**

We once looked to the stars and dreamed of possibilities.

Silent watchers, observing the last days of Earth, what could have been? What could we have changed if we reached for the sooner? The world's worst sin was apathy. Not one event was the end. It was a slow decline in which we did nothing. A million glimmering possibilities left unexplored, left to dreams and dust. The fires grow fewer and fewer through each long night. It is only a matter of time until we are nothing more than a memory, a last flicker slowly fading in the dark.

Serpent of Ragnarök

They led him to the center of the long house, facing the gathered council with the fire at his back. The flames highlighted the sharp planes of his face and teased over the distinctive scares scrolled on the curve of his left cheek. Irons on his wrists dragged on his posture, hunching his shoulders. His tongue darted out, tasting the air like a curious serpent. An apt comparison, since he'd slithered out of Forseti's hold thrice over. _Not this time, not when they caught him up to his elbows in entrails._

The skald leaned forward, apprehensive what sentence the Ting would deliver the murderous whoreson.

"If they were smart, they'd remove his hands before exiling him," said a gruff voice beside him. The skald looked askance at his companion, refusing to divert his complete attention away from the prisoner.

"If they were smart, they would send him directly to Hel."

The other man snorted, his reply withheld as Raevil stepped forward to address the gathered men.

"Jokul Grundison, you are guilty of unwarranted slayings. By judgment of the Ting you are banished from these lands. Your fate shall be decided by the sea. Pray to the gods for mercy."

Acquiescent murmurs rose around them, but the skald did not withdraw his scrutiny from the prisoner. It was he, and he alone, who caught the smile twitching at Jokul's chapped lips.

***

Most prisoners stood in stoic silence or choked sobs as their vessels were made ready to cast them to the open water. They certainly did not whistle a jaunty little tune. It made the men nervous, casting a speculative eye at Jokul as they loaded the sparse provisions on a boat little bigger than a faering and about as seaworthy.

Further up the beach, the skald and his companion also observed the spectacle, the surf teasing the sand at their feet.

"There is something amiss," he whispered to the salt air, "We are playing into the hands of a power greater than one man."

His companion laid a massive hand on his shoulder. "I've not had enough drink for talk of the gods this early. You worry too much my friend. That slip of a boat will sink at the first shift in the wind and that will be the end of it."

"Then why is he so bloody confident, Hamal?"

The big man shrugged, and absently flicked a biting fly from his arm. "I'm certain he'd remain confident if you set him on fire. Can we be off before I'm nibbled down to my bones?"

The skald spared a rare smile for the man. "All that mead yesterday has sweetened your taste." The two turned to go as the whistling tapered off.

"Leaving without saying goodbye, Eadric?"

The skald tensed at his name, turning to the man who used to steal sips of ale from their father's table with him. The one who'd shared so many secrets, except for the darkest one.

"Farewell, _brother_ , may the gods spit on you when you meet them."

Jokul grinned, wisps of his unwashed hair caught in the sparse patches of beard on his chin. He'd lost a great deal of weight during his confinement, leaving his skin gaunt and gray. The image of a true madman where his elder brother once stood.

"Ah, but my god is always with me," he said, his eyes large and luminous in his sunken face.

Two of the shore men grabbed Jokul's shoulders, escorting him into the craft before releasing him from irons. It only took three of them to launch the skiff from shore. Eadric looked on as the ship was caught up in the off shore currents and swept out to open ocean. He kept watching until his murderous sibling was nothing but a speck on the horizon.

***

Twelve years later...

He stood in a world of whispering shadows. It was a world he'd visited many times before, he waited to see which god would whisper in his ear this eve.

Silence fell. The skald frowned; this was different. The shadows curled away like morning fog. It was a slanted space, a swaying space, he could hear the groan of wood against water, and a faint rhythmic drum beat overhead. A ship's hold, one he'd never seen. Woven baskets, high as his waist, took up most of the space, filled to the brim with strange fruits. The skald frowned. A hold of spoiling fruits couldn't be all he was meant to see. He made his way to the rope ladder, pulling himself up into the brilliant daylight.

The deck crawled with dark skinned men, clad in poorly scraped skins and bright feathered armbands. The sun shone off their sweat slicked black hair and lent a feverish gleam to their dark eyes. Their grunts and calls joined the low roar of the surrounding ocean, all secondary to the ever present drumbeat. He followed the discordant rhythm, as it beat against his bones, to the rear of the ship. Beside the drum stood the figure, covered in bloody skins, face obscured by the preserved head of a massive snake, only the scarred hands were visible, pale as his own. The figure paused, lifting his head so the sun lit on the side of his face including the tracery of all too familiar scars.

_Impossible_.

Behind the ship, the ocean burst upward, an explosion of froth that continued to boil towards the sky until the creature broke the surface, rising high overhead. A serpentine body thicker than the great oaks of his homeland towered over the ship. The skald felt the weight of ancient eyes on him. A dripping crown of feathers lifted as its great mouth opened wide. He felt the roar in his soul.

***

Eadric threw himself onto the bench beside Hamal, downing the waiting tankard of ale in an unbroken chug. The blacksmith slid another full mug in front of him when he came up for air.

"So how did your meeting with the Ting go, then?"

The skald paused long enough to glare at the man, downing another hearty gulp. "I think you knew how it was going to go better than I did."

Hamal shrugged his shaggy shoulders. "You may be the voice of the gods, my friend, but their purses speak louder." He tossed back his own ale. "Sending ships to scout the waters for your giant bird snake and a boat of little dark men is far too costly for our glorious leaders."

Eadric grimaced. "I know how it sounds, but I'm telling you it was a warning from the gods. I saw his scars. It has to be him."

Hamal gripped his forearm, his blue eyes abnormally serious. "I believe, most of the people would believe you. The gods don't take their warnings lightly, but for your brother to have survived in that spit of a boat is damn impossible."

"Perhaps he had a god on his side," said Eadric, recalling Jokul's final words on the shore all those years ago. The idea of his mad brother garnering the attention of any god was shudder some, though few answered a call so violent. "The Ting have become godless men, and men who do not respect their gods invite disaster..."

His companion wasn't listening, his attention on the stream of patrons rapidly exiting the door. "What's this then?"

Eadric attempted to sharpen his ale muddled senses, catching snippets of shouts and bellows outside. "Something's washed ashore." Both men swayed to look at each other before scrambling to their feet, using each other as a brace to join the growing crowd on the beach.

A group of men were dragging a skiff to shore, its battered pennant whipping in chill wind. The small vessel slid onto the sand a few feet away from Eadric's unsteady feet, revealing a bloodied blue lipped unconscious youth on the bottom.

"Fetch a healer!" Hamal bellowed, dropping to his knees to place a hand on the boy's pale forehead. Eadric could hear the whispers of disbelief and horror surrounding them.

"A mere boy..."

"That's Melnir's shield sign, he's a Jarl in Greenland..."

"He must have been out here for days..."

"What's he got there in his hand?"

Eadric knelt beside his companion, attempting to gently uncurl the boy's clenched fist. The youth's eye fluttered open, emitting a weak cough. His mouth moved, the words inaudible, his voice lost to the sea. Eadric leaned in, lending his ear to the boys final words. The skald sat back on his heels, stunned, fingering the object he retrieved from the dying boy.

"What did he say, Eadric?"

"Greenland has fallen." The skald held up his hand, revealing a band of brightly colored feathers, flecked with dried blood.

***

It was the dream again. Eadric paused as he found himself in the hold of rotting fruit once again. _What could the gods be trying to show me, what have I missed?_

The Ting finally cracked, presented with a dead body and evidence their skald spoke of more than feverish nightmares. A scout ship was launched with the purpose of illuminating the unfortunate boys last earthly claim. The Ting proclaimed the idea of Greenland falling to the likes of his dream invaders preposterous, yet here he stood again.

The serpent was waiting for him when he emerged topside, displaying not a coat of scales by feathers, ranging in vibrant greens and deep hued blues, to astonishing reds the exact color of fresh blood. It hovered over the hooded man like a watchful guard dog, weaving against the ocean breeze. It peered down at him with an ancient reptilian intelligence. The weight of its gaze called to a fear old as time that made his bowels clench and his eyes water as stared without blinking. He was so focused on the serpent he almost missed the movement to his right, out over the water.

_Don't take your eyes from it_ , his instincts screamed, but the draw was too strong. Eadric's gaze rotated until he saw the woman. She stood, still as stone on the surface of the water, unmoving as the wind tangled her pale tresses, tugging at her simple woven garments. Her grey green eyes watched him, the exact color as the roiling waters beneath her feet. She raised a pale slender arm, beckoning him toward her.

A hiss sounded in his ear. Eadric whipped around, confronted with the snake helm of the hooded man. The man titled his face upward, revealing Jokul's mad eyes, and something else, something twisted and vile, reflected in the edge of the raised knife.

Eadric woke when the blade plunged into his heart.

***

"It's been too long," said Eadric, staring into the frothy surf as it beat against the rocky shoreline.

"They've only been gone a few weeks."

"Nearly two months, Hamal, they should have found something and returned by now."

Hamal snorted into the wind. "I think you are over estimating the capabilities of our fine scouts." He glanced sidelong at the skald, noting the deep smudges under his friend's eyes. "Still having those dreams?"

"Every night." Eadric absently rubbed his sternum, wondering how many more dreams of death it would take to drive him mad as his brother.

"I have chores that need tending," said Hamal, clapping a hand on Eadric shoulders. The contact told him the skald was losing too much weight too fast. "I'm sure they will return soon..." His fingers tightened on Eadric's shoulder as the vessel floated through the rolling fog, a bobbing mass of charred wood inexorably making for the shore.

It was not the scout ship, but something worse, another warning, another blood soaked passenger. This one was still alive, tumbling from the boat into the surf as he screamed for help. A jagged cut ran down his face, gangrenous from lack of treatment. He collapsed to his knees in the sand, vomiting bile and salt water. Eadric bolted down the shore for him, catching the man as he fell to the sand, his whole body trembling.

"Where do you come from, tell us what has happened?" Eadric asked gently as he could, worried exhaustion would win out before the man passed along his message.

A pair of well-made boots came to a halt beside them. "Yes, tell us what has happened." Raevil frowned down on the pair, as if the carcass of some deep ocean monster washed up on shore rather than a man.

After a bout of wracking coughs, the man spoke. "Reykjavik has been destroyed. They appeared out of the morning fog, no warning, no war drums, and no purpose beyond death. They slaughtered all and any in their path. They showed no signs of stopping there." His raspy voice fell on the silent folk who gathered on the beachhead.

Raevil reacted first. "Ready a Knarr!" He bellowed. "Who among you will seek out this enemy and send his ship to the bottom of the sea?"

Many stepped forward, including Hamal. The skald climbed to his feet and stepped forward.

"I'll go."

***

"If it is your brother, what does he want?" Hamal's question was a needed distraction. Eadric kept watch on deck for nearly two days straight, sleeping spare hours and eating little to nothing. The blacksmith worried the gods were shouting too loudly in his friend's ear.

"If I could answer that, mayhap I could answer why he killed two innocent families all those years ago." He pinched the bridge of his nose, the salt soaked wind caressing his weary face. How he longed for this all to be over. "I would give all the ale in the storehouse for one damn solid answer to any of this."

"I think you're about to get your wish."

"What?" Eadric followed the blacksmith's line of sight. "Oh, this does not bode well."

They floated toward the wreck. The scout ship had scraped itself into a wreck on a shoal of rock, its sails shredded, the deck listing on its side. It offered a display of the horrors on board.

"By the gods," Hamal whispered. His sentiments were echoed as the others came to join them, drawn to the carnage like curious flies.

The scout ship's crew was on display, hung by their wrists, throats slashed open in a grim smile at odds with the ragged holes in their chests. Their hearts were missing. All of them dead, Eadric noticed the movement; all except one.

"There!" he called. The men scrambled into action. Lashed against the mast, one man was still alive. They drew close, preparing to board the stranded ship when the man snapped awake with a scream.

"He's coming! He's coming!"

The men hesitated.

"We need to get him aboard, the man is witless." Eadric urged, appealing to them. It took only two of them to extract the raving man, laying him on the deck of the knarr. By this time the screaming abated to wide eyed babbling.

"He's coming, the scarred one, disciple of the Dark God, bringer of Ragnorak, he's coming, he's coming."

_The scarred one_. Eadric closed his eyes, clasping the man's hand. He wasn't long for this world. Possibly neither were they.

"It's him, isn't it, it's your brother," It wasn't a question from Hamal, but Eadric answered him all the same.

"Yes, against all odds it appears Jokul survived."

"What does he want? Did he truly sack the colonies? What is his aim?" This came from Thorstein, the knarr's burly navigator. The skald's expression turned bleak.

"Didn't you hear the man? My brother seeks Ragnorak. He plans to destroy us all."

"There can't be one ship, Eadric," said Hamal, his expression grim. "Something is missing, the gods didn't show you everything."

Eadric nodded, weary to his bones. "They showed me enough. We need to make for home, and pray we reach its shores first."

***

He didn't know when sleep claimed him, not until he looked down to see the ocean swirling beneath his feet. The moment he raised his gaze, he saw what he'd failed to see on the deck of Jokul's ship, so caught up in his stare down with the feathered serpent.

Hundreds of ships floated around him, filled with the chatter of the foreign warriors, each deck lit by brazier of red flame that drew their bloody path across the water. Their direction was unmistakable. Eadric opened his mouth, to shout, to call out, he wasn't sure; only to find the action halted by a slender hand on his mouth.

The woman's blond curls caressed his cheek; she kept her cool hand against his lips until the ships passed. When she released him, he turned to her, stunned by her beauty and her height; she had several inches on him. Her grey green eyes brimmed with sadness. She placed her palm to his cheek, and pressed a kiss to his forehead. Her lips burned like ice, and left the after image of swirling snow.

***

The shore was burning.

Eadric emerged on deck to find the crew silent, staring at the rising smoke. Hamal noticed him first.

"We couldn't wake you. They passed us in the night. Eerie as hell but somehow they didn't see us, or they ignored us."

He could still feel the woman's lips on his forehead and wondered if there was a mark to show for it. "A goddess protected us," said Eadric. He turned to Hamal's snort.

"What?"

"Our world is crumbling around us and you look like you got the best night's sleep in weeks." He cast a sneer in the direction of the shore. "What do we do now? Can we really beat them home?"

"Yes, we must."

***

Perhaps it was due to death nipping at their heels. The knarr reached the shores of the village half a day ahead of the invading fleet. The air was thick with fear. A messenger beat them there, delivering news of the attack on their neighbors up the coast. As soon as the skald and the other volunteers touched the shore, they were whisked into a war council.

Raevil was talking as they entered, laying out their defenses. "We will hold this town to the last and break these dogs on our blades," he proclaimed, punctuated by a fist on the table. "We have the advantage here, the foresight of their coming." His eyes flickered to Eadric. "We will not fall."

"To stay would be a mistake," said the skald, holding his ground as the collective stares of the room weighed on his shoulders.

"What madness do you speak?" Raevil scowled at him. "This is our home, our livelihood; it must be defended to the last man!"

"And the last woman? The last child?" He met the Jarl's scowl. "This is not a conquering invader; it is the force of a destroyer. They care nothing for riches or resources, their aim is Ragnorak. They will slaughter everyone down to the last defenseless infant and raze our livelihood to the ground." He touched his forehead, brushing his fingers over the chilled spot where the goddess laid her lips on him, evoking a memory of snow. "The gods themselves wish us to flee, not fight."

The Jarl scoffed, "Gods or not, if we break them, we can end this."

Eadric looked up, his expression cold. "Perhaps you don't remember my brother, Raevil, but I do. Most of all I remember his madness. He will send an army of blood thirsty men against us until he shatters us because their lives are nothing to him. He will not stop."

A tense moment passed between the two, witnessed by a room of silent desperate men, before the Jarl's shoulders slumped. "Where do you propose we run to?"

Eadric could feel the kiss of snow on his skin. "North, we'll retreat further into the land of ice where their sun drenched warriors can't follow us."

Raevil nodded, addressing the room. "Prepare your families. I still need able bodied men to cover their escape. Who will defend the retreat with me?"

The skald was the first to stand.

***

After numerous arguments, Eadric convinced Hamal to go with the rest of the villagers. Great friend that he was, he wished to stay by the skald's side to the end, but Eadric knew Hamal's wife would never forgive him. They would need the skills of a blacksmith where they were going; they would need every craftsman to aid in their survival. A skald was expendable. Another would rise to take his place.

Armed with the knowledge Hamal was on his way to relative safety, Eadric stood with the others waiting on the beach. They watched their deaths sail toward them on jewel toned boats, patiently braced as the horde of dark skinned half naked men threw themselves into the surf, slavering for the first kill.

The fighting began with the clash of metal against metal and the slick give of flesh to blade. Blood ran into the ocean, dying the surf red. The invaders came at them in an endless wave, undeterred by the piles of their dead surrounding the Jarl's forces. Eadric could see why when the first of the defenders were overwhelmed, driven to the ground, pinned down, a blade inserted through their ribs. The sound of breaking bones and death cries filled the air. Some of them were still screaming when their hearts were pulled from their chests. The skald watched in frozen horror as Thorstein's heart was ripped from his body. His killer raised the heart to the sky with a wild yell, reveling in the blood that rained on his face.

They fought on, determined to give their people as much distance between them and these monsters as they could. Eadric watched his comrades die around him, wondering when it would be his turn. The answer came striding up the beach, parting the swarm of fighting as he made his way to the skald.

Jokul stood before him. He'd stripped down to only the snake head hood and a wrap around his waist. The attire revealed his heavily scarred body, further gnarled and twisted by whatever dark contracts his brother made to bring him to these shores. He spread his arms, one hand clutching the same shining black knife he'd used to stab Eadric in his dreams.

"Aren't you going to welcome me home, brother?" He leered, a moment before he brought the hilt of his knife to the skald's temple.

***

Eadric woke in a make shift cage. He wasn't sure what roused him until he saw the flaxen haired goddess fiddling with the locks. A dark cloak covered her shoulders, the hood concealing her in shadow but for the wisps of blond hair that flit about her beautiful face. A shift of posture cast a dull shine to her cloak, enough for him to make out the interlay of raven feathers.

"Great Frejya," Eadric whispered fervently, dropping prostrate to bow. The lock gave way. Delicate hands lifted his face, bringing him eye to eye with the mournful goddess.

"Do not kneel, dear one, you are my servant no longer. I can only hope to ensure you're part of my legacy."

"Goddess?" Eadric followed Frejya as she led him through the ravaged great hall, blood stains and shards of wood the only signs the battle raged from beyond the shore. "How long have I been out?"

"Long enough for the Toltecs to stake their claim."

The skald blinked at her, hearing the name of their enemy fall so carelessly from her lips. "Is that who Jokul ensnared to do his bidding?"

She nodded, her features tight. "He had help. The great betrayer, one who has succeeded in bringing our children to their demise." They emerged outside, the air thick with acrid smoke and the dueling scents of burnt wood and meat. Eadric looked out on his decimated village and caught his breath, his steps faltered.

They hung from hastily fashioned spikes, their bodies left in the same grisly manner as the ones they found on the scout ship. His breath soured in his throat, tinged with bile as he looked on men he'd known all his life skewered like animals for slaughter _. My brother has done this, my mad brother and his dark god._

"The feathered serpent, is he the one who stole my brother's mind?"

Frejya drew up short, her grey green eyes wide with shock. "He revealed himself to you?" She looked out over the carnage of his village, a silvery tear traced down her flawless face. "No, my skald, what you saw was merely another god paying for the mistakes of his children. Now he has become a herald for the end."

Eadric remembered the massive serpent, that ancient anger wafting down on Jokul's vessel. _Not directed at me_. "Then who?"

Frejya cried out, arching toward him. Jokul loomed behind her; his black blade plunged into her side. He held the goddess like a lover, cradling her to him. He leaned his mouth to her ear.

"You were always so beautiful."

She shrieked as he twisted the knife once, throwing her to the side to catch Eadric wrists as the skald jumped at him.

"What have you done?" Eadric screamed, wresting for control of the bloodied blade. His brother's strength was shocking for his brittle frame. Jokul's face was calm as he watched the skald's despair.

"You think you were the only one chosen by the gods brother? I too was chosen, for a far greater purpose than listening to their blather in dreams."

"Who," Eadric choked out, "what god dripped such poison in your ear?"

Jokul smiled, his teeth a blackened mess. "I told you once; my god is always with me." His eyes shone a bright poisonous green, the pupils slit like a great cat.

"Loki." Frejya's angry hiss reached him a beat behind his own recognition. The great trickster, the betrayer, the god who would bring Ragnorak. Bring it he did.

Jokul, vessel of the dark god, turned to give Frejya a flattered grin, nodding his head in a bow of acknowledgement. Eadric took advantage of the distraction. He shoved his brother, hooking a foot behind Jokul's ankle to send them both rolling on the ground. The skald could not tell up from down, pouring all his concentration into keeping the knife from his innards while trying to yank it free. Pain flared in his ribs from a stray punch. Jokul bashed the skald's nose with his greasy head. Grimly, Eadric held on, until a dip in the ground changed their positions.

It was a second, only a second when his brother's fingers slackened on the knife, but it was enough to twist it back on its wielder. Jokul's body shuddered, seizing up as the blade slid between his ribs. The skald didn't realize he was dead until Frejya pulled him from beneath the corpse.

The two supported one another, goddess and skald, using the other's strength to remain standing. With a pained huff, Frejya kicked Jokul's slack body over, his vacant eyes staring at the heavens. His expression was serene in death.

"Is it over?"

The goddess shook her head, bending far enough to close Jokul's lids. "Your brother was an unfortunate tool. His death freed him, but what has been set in motion here cannot be stopped by the loss of one man. The Toltecs will continue their path of madness to its end. You must flee into the North, my skald, flee where they cannot follow."

"What will you do?" Eadric eyed the wound at her side, which continued to sluggishly bleed. Frejya looked out to the ocean, a flash of lightning in her eyes.

"We will do what we must, fulfill our roles," her cool gaze met his. "All of us."

Eadric looked out to the waters, catching sight of the great feathered serpent rising above the waves. He turned back to find his goddess gone. The skald sagged, feeling the depth of his wounds as the spirit of battle left his body. His temple throbbed incessantly, joined by various aches and bruises all over, but he was alive and he had a purpose to complete. He looked down at his brother's ravaged visage, unable to recognize the boy who grew up by his side in that torn up face.

It was a monumental effort, the strain almost too much for him, but the skald dragged his brother's body through the village to the shoreline, heaving him into the surf until the ocean reclaimed him. The undertow snagged Jokul's body, drawing him further out into the ocean. The great snake watched the procession, until the body began to float further out into the open water. Then it vanished beneath the waves. Eadric knew his brother's body would not visit these shores again.

The skald staggered from the beach and began his long journey North.

Glossary

_Skald_ -a bard, storyteller, prophet.

_Jarl_ \- Viking aristocracy

_Knarr_ -long boat, warship

_Hel_ -Goddess of hell and the underworld

_Ting_ \- a council of twelve Viking males, typically jarls who dispensed the law.

_Forseti_ \- Norse god of justice

_Frejya_ \- Norse goddess of love, beauty, fertility, war, and death

_Loki_ \- Trickster god, the one who kicks off Ragnorak

_Ragnorak_ -the Norse end of times, the great battle at the end of the world

_Reykjavik_ -the only city of Iceland, settled in the 9th century A.D.

_Quetzalcoatl_ \- the great feathered serpent was a deity in favor of life, opposed to his brother Tezcatlipoca, the god of night, magic, and destiny.

Hiroshima's Run

There aren't really any tried and true strategies for winning at cards against a six armed alien with a vicious temper and poison spit.

Rip'em Jarkaroo had the reputation of a sore loser, possibly due to a bad habit of relieving his opponents of their limbs when he lost. Despite this, I refused to fold. It wasn't my choice to make port on this back water swill of a planet, twenty light years from the whisper of the law, and I'd be damned if I was going to lose any spank money to a slavering moronic mess like Rip'em.

The bugger couldn't hold his drink, already three sheets to the wind after a couple shots of frontier moonshine. Two of his arms kept grabbing at the unfortunate Vargosian chained in the corner.

It was rare seeing one out this far and judging by the swollen state of her lady parts she would be in heat soon. I needed to be far from this piss hole before she flooded the bar with hormones. Lonely, horny people were good for business. They drank more. If I wasn't on such a tight schedule I might have indulged in a few memorable indiscretions, but my load of goods was due on the Gallows in two days time. Those people didn't appreciate tardiness. If I wanted to leave with my payment and no grievous wounds, I had to reclaim my stack of chips from this drunken idiot without losing my remaining good arm in the process.

"Come on, Hiroshim, call it or draw a card," Rip'em snarled, haucking a dollop of spit on the table. It sizzled, slowly melting into the wood.

Rip'em was ugly even for a Triniad. His normally angular face was dented and scarred from one too many fights. One of his eyes stalks was crooked. His breath reeked of month old garbage and rotting vegetable matter. For all their strength and biological advantages, the Triniads were mostly vegetarians. Angry, savage, vegetarians.

I forced myself to stop looking at the chunk of Rip'em's previous meal wedged between his teeth and studied my hand. It wasn't a great one. Strata was an old game, not like the sleek multi-dimensional games played on the inner ring. It was similar enough to Poker that it could be played with a deck of human playing cards. The terms were different, and the winning hands were much harder to figure out but I studied this game inside and out on the long hours between ports. What else was there to do in space.

"Draw me a card."

Rip'em slid a card from the top of the deck in front of me. I took a moment to peek at it, praying for a face card. A nine of spades. Damn. It wasn't a complete loss. Spades was the highest suit. I glanced at at the Triniad. His other eye stalk was drooping, dulled by drink. The hands that held his cards had a slight tremor while a third errant arm brought another a third shot to his lips. My brow raised at that. Reputation or not, Rip'em was drunk, stinking drink, repent for your sins drunk. Not the sort I could see ripping my arms off if he lost a hand, unless he fell on me in the process.

"I call," I said, giving him a confident smirk as I added my last chips to the pile.

That's when it happened. The six arm, the unoccupied one, casually slipped up from under the table to rifle a few 'new' cards into place. Did he think I wouldn't notice it? Probably too gone to care. That does it. I was willing to do this the tried and true proper way but if he was going to cheat, he needed to be more subtle about it. Two could play that came.

I have one good arm, the arm I was born with. I also have a great one. A bad skiff accident a few years back and a mechanic's refurbishment left me with a replacement. I happen to add a few upgrades myself. Keeping my eyes up on the Triniad, I pressed a hidden pocket of my wrist against the table. The hologram gave off the dullest sheen before settling into place over the cards. A hand full of face cards, with a pair of smiling Royal Ladies to take the pot. Why it was my lucky day.

Rip'em gave me a sloppy grin, with two rows of chlorophyll stained square teeth, and laid out his hand. Even his cheating game was weak. He slipped a couple of Bearded Gentlemen into his hand but nothing to beat what I now held. He was already reaching for the pot when I laid mine down, careful not to unsettle the holographic overlay.

"Hoo ha, thanks for the game buddy," I said reaching for my winnings. The hologram was temporary but it would last long enough for me to collect and run, possibly faster than I originally intended. Rip'em peered blearily at the cards, the realization slowly crawling across his face. He blinked at the cards, a bit of shine creeping back into his inebriated eye stalks.

"You...won....," his lips curled in a sneer of disbelief. A dribble of saliva leaked from the corner of his mouth, sizzling over his vest. You'd think they would invest in acid proof clothing or maybe most Triniads knew better than to get falling down drunk. He staggered to his feet, using all six arms to brace himself as his trunk like legs wobbled. There were calculations playing over his mug. When his fists punched through the table top, it was time to go. Stuffing the last few chips in my pockets, I rose amid the flutter of cards and chips of wood, scooting out of the way as he sent the table flying in my direction. The other patrons of the bar made themselves scarce, practically melting into the walls. Must be used to this sort of thing. The bartender sank through the floor on a swift moving platform, leaving me and the half naked Vargosian to Rip'em's Wrath.

The Vargosian....shite...the poor girl looked on wide eyed, pulling at the chained collar round her neck. The barman couldn't arrange cover for his own slag he didn't deserve to keep her.

Three of Rip'em's fist came flying at my face. I happen to like my face and the few scars I had gave me a certain roguish quality. A tri-fold crater would probably dent my rakish charm. With a duck and a roll, I came up behind him, flipping a chair up and over to smash his thick head. Didn't do much good, but it slowed him long enough for me to grip the Vargosian's chain with my great arm. The piston's creaked but I yanked it from the stud, scooping her up as Rip'em rounded on us. The remains of the table smashed the space we just left, causing the girl to squeak in my arms. Nothing for it, I tucked her close and made a mad dash for the door, listening to Rip'em bellow and curse behind us. Idiot managed to trap himself good between broken furniture. Pretty thing like her didn't belong here anyway...

Damn, she must have released her hormones.

I kept pace to my ship, trying not to imagine what my new passenger looked like beneath the skimpy bits of cloth the barman had her trussed up in.

New plan, throw her in the hold, drop off the cargo for the Gallows, take her home. Would probably be easier if she stopped licking my neck.

I slammed a fist against the hatch of the ship, trying to keep my blood from flowing south as my impromptu passenger started to rub against me like a cat in heat. I didn't even know her name-

"Hiroshim," she purred. Apparently she paid more attention to our game than I thought, enough to pick up my name. The Vargosian swung her legs down to wrap them around my waist. Damn, she had strong thighs.

"Easy there, miss," I said, sliding my free arm under her to lift her up a bit higher. Lovely, I would have to make my delivery with the biggest case of blue balls-

"Hiroshim!" Rip'em roared, bursting through the tavern door.

My manly bits may have retracted a bit there as the ground shook under the Triniad's charge.

I cussed, darting myself and my new lady friend into the safety of my ship. I had to make this quick or Rip'em would make good on his moniker and tear my ship apart.

The hatch slid closed behind us in time to meet a hail of fists. I tried not to think of the dents to my baby as I carried the Vargosian to the cockpit, sliding her into the vacant co-pilot's chair. Nobody sat there since Charlie. More bad memories I didn't want to examine too closely.

"Alright sweetheart, I need you to sit tight while I get us out of here." Her hands lingered on me as I stepped away, pushing buttons as I went. There was not enough time to give the ship a proper warm up. I pulled on the manual controls as Rip'em once again slammed his fists into my hull.

"Ass-wad," I muttered, kicking the whining engines into high gear. The blow back sent the Triniad tumbling away, roaring and snarling the whole way. The ship lifted into the air, climbing up and up through the atmosphere until Rip'em couldn'd even follow my dust trail.

Another planet I had to scratch off my port list. At this rate I was going to run out of places to drink.

Once my ship burst through the upper atmosphere, smoothing into the star currents, I chanced a glance at my new passenger. The Vargosian stared out at the stars in wonder, her expression slightly pained. Her hands cupped her erogenous zones, her dusky skin so flushed it was cherry red in full blown heat. I could smell the hormones wafting off of her, the heavy scent of flowers and warm sugar. It made my skin feel tight.

It was going to be a long flight to the Gallows.

***

Her name was Lililette.

There are a lot of things you can learn in a tight space when you are trying to think of anything but the feel of each others skin. She was in a bad way, but also felt the same reluctance pouncing on a complete stranger for a shag. It was only her second season in heat. Slavers snagged her out in the open as she foraged for food on the plains of her home world. It happens, specially in this part of the galaxy. Money and goods make the rules, and the fastest draw is the lawman. Most of the time I kept my head down and my nose clean, but there were cases, like Lililette's, I stumbled into. I didn't regret getting involved. Imagining Rip'em's paws on her was enough to convince me, hormones or not, I did the right thing grabbing her. If all went smoothly with the Gallows, I could drop her off on my way back to grab my next run.

Lili didn't ask too many questions, a good quality in these parts. I set up her in the ship's shower to release some of her heat and prayed she didn't blow through my water supply before I made dock again. I preferred not to meet my current employers smelling like a shine soaked ashtray.

Thankfully, she restrained herself enough for me to rinse up, though she did roll in my bed a few times while I bathed. On whole, the remainder of my trip to the Gallows was a smooth one despite the addition of my horny passenger.

***

"What is that?" Lili breathed, hugging the back of my chair. Her latest quick shower left her smelling like a spring meadow and she wore one of my shirts. It came part way down her thighs. If I wasn't so pissed scared of my upcoming meeting I would be seriously turned on by the little minx, though my body stood at attention despite itself.

"That would be the Gallows," I said.

The Gallows was a sprawling mess of mining junkers and warships, commandeered by the Freeman's Army, over a few decades, to make a maze-like fortress of rusting metal and radiated warheads. Its occupants were lean and mean-eyed, full of spit and vinegar, and ready to chew the face off of anyone who didn't do things their way. Goregage, the current head of the army, was held together by clever wiring and scar tissue. He'd seen more scrapes and fire fights in his life than a dozen of his underlings combined. I hated this place, and the man, in equal fashion.

Least I would be paid. He was a man of his word, though it didn't do well to anger Goregage or his lieutenants. It was why I made sure my delivery was on time. Didn't mean I would get out of here unscathed. I eased my ship through the narrow docking bay, turning to Lili once the ship settled on the floor.

"Keep the doors locked, don't admit anyone but me, no matter what they say." I said, slipping off a shoulder holster. Goregage frowned on weapons in his presence, especially if they weren't his own.

"When will you be back?" Lili whispered, her dark eyes frightened. It was touching, even with her hormones flooding my cabin, that she felt real concern for me. Of course I was her ride home, but I took her concern at face value. I gave her pointed chin a gentle pinch.

"Let's hope I _make it back_ ," I said, giving her a grin. She held her tongue as I prepped the cargo on a hover-board, coordinating it to follow my lead like a stray dog. I tried not to think of her wide eyes as I departed, wishing I could have spent the last few hours in the arms of a beautiful woman.

***

"Ah, Hiroshim, punctual! I like that in my runners." Goregage stumped toward me. Sometime between now and our last encounter, the man lost his entire right foot. The missing appendage was now a sturdy stub of brass coated titanium that made a metallic hollow thunk as he walked.

I nodded to him. "Three crates of preserved rations and four crates of medical supplies as ordered. One case of settler moonshine compliments of Sir Vega of Parlith Prime." Goregage wasn't just a war chief, he was an important client. It took a lot of supplies to run an operation of this size in the middle of the galaxy's colon and he paid handsomely for those services.

That included my fee.

Goregage made a show of thumping around the hovering cargo, inspecting it with a series of hums and haws. The smell of expensive pipe weed wafted off his surcoat. Empire pipe weed. Damn, the other side was trading with him now.

"All seems in order lad. Are you staying for a night or kicking off again for the next run?"

Refusing Goregage's hospitality could be a bit...tricky. I smiled, bowing my head. "Sorry, sir, this is just a drop and run. My contacts have another run lined up for me halfway across the system-"

His interrupted my excuse with a wet coughing laugh that rasped deep in his chest. "The life of a young smuggler, Hiroshim, little time for dalliances. Off with you, boy, though you will have to refuel at the next port. We are a bit light before the next shipment." He held out a cred stick, a standard form of payment. I'd have the credits in my account as soon as I could slot it in the ship's computer. I took it from him with a cordial nod, turning to leave.

Goregage's meaty fingers snapped around my wrist. "I like you lad. You're efficient, punctual, and you have a mean spark in your eye. Bit more muscle on you, I bet you'd have made a good soldier. That is why I am giving you a warning. Plus the drunken cheat is a bit of a putz, but he is a loyal lieutenant."

I paled at the description. He didn't need to say who, there was only one drunken cheat I'd pissed off in recent memory. Goregage almost looked apologetic, as if death on my heels was an inconvenience he thought distasteful.

"I can give you safety until you reach the hold. On deck, it's free space, no rules." Goregage released my wrist. "I hope to do business with you again. I'd run if I were you, boy."

I didn't need telling twice. I bolted for my ship, weaving through the crowd at top speed. I had to beat him. What if he scented Lili's hormones? Stomach twisting, I burst into the docking bay, swiping the sweat off my brow. Last thing I needed was sweat running in my eyes if he came at me here. My nerves were screaming as I bolted for my ship. Nothing seemed amiss. The door was still firmly sealed shut. I could see Lili peeping at me from the cockpit window, a relieved smile on her face at the sight of me.

I was still watching her pretty face when her expression fell, steam rolled by fear. I didn't need her frantic gestures to know I was in trouble. I could feel the metal flooring vibrating under my feet. Triniad's were not stealthy. Tucking my chin down, I put on another burst of speed. I could make it, I had to make it. If he caught me out here, I was a dead man. Lili disappeared from the window. That was bad, she probably didn't want to watch me get slaughtered. I had my hand out in front of me, my fingertips brushing the lock when four arms snagged the back of my shirt, yanking me up and over so I landed in a crumpled heap behind him.

Rip'em Jarkaroo. He smelled twice as bad as the last time I saw him and had a fresh burn across his face. Most likely from my ship's thrusters. He also looked ready to put a serious hurt on me, which he commenced with a swift kick to the stomach that slammed me up against the hull of the ship next to us. I lost the breath to yell, slumping to the ground with a pitiful groan. Rip'em stood over me, his expression murderous.

"Nobody cheats _me_ , punk. And this?" He squatted down, drawing one a hand along his burn while his others curled into fists. "This you will die for." The fists raised, ready to come crashing down. I wanted to close my eyes but everything hurt to much. I was going to watch my death come at me full speed. Didn't even get to collect my payment. Through Rip'em's overpowering stench I thought I caught a hint of flowers.

She dropped on him from the overhanging ship, wrapping those beautiful thighs around the Triniad's thick neck. She spun in a graceful arc, the hem of my shirt lifting to give a tantalizing view of her bare lower region before the crack of bone soured the moment.

Rip'em Jarkaroo fell limp to the floor beside me, his ugly mug lolling, and eyestalks gone sightless. I turned my gaze up to Lili, the bay lights haloing her red skin. She glowed like a vengeful demon. Her hands slid under me, helping me up as her dark eyes looked at me with concern.

"You okay?" she whispered, slipping an arm around my bruised waist.

I coughed, leaning on her. She supported my weight without trouble. Vargosian's were much stronger than they looked. "You saved me," I said. Part of me wanted to kiss her. The other part wanted to leave her here and run. She did smell pretty damn good.

A smile lit up her face, blasting me like a ray of sunshine. "Seems fair. You rescued me first."

My lips twitched. "Let's get out of here," I said, letting her help me onto the ship. She took her seat in the co-pilot's chair. Truthfully, she looked pretty good sitting there. Lili didn't say anything as I maneuvered the ship free from the Gallows. I didn't worry about Goregage coming after us. He gave Rip'em one shot at me. Not my fault the Triniad died. They certainly wouldn't blame Lili for his death. The whole episode would likely make the big man laugh. I might consider taking another run for them...in a few years.

Lili was fidgeting in the corner of my vision. I set our course, putting the ship on auto-pilot to turn to my passenger. "I can take you home now."

She chewed on her lip. "What if I don't want to go home?"

I sat back, folding my arms over my chest. The movement made me wince. Rip'em must have bruised my ribs. "What skills can you bring to the table?"

Lili raised a brow. "What skills are you looking for?" It was an honest question. I looked her over. She was pure sin wearing nothing but my shirt. No one would guess she could snap a Triniad's neck with her thighs.

I grinned. "How do you feel about being the muscle?"

That blinding smile again. I could used to that. "I think I can work with that." She stretched her hands over her head, delivering another memorable view. Her nose crinkled. "I smell rotting vegetables."

I sighed. I was going to have to expand my water supply to accommodate her. "Go head, grab a shower."

Lili rose, sauntering across the cabin. She paused at the door, turning back. "You know, you could use a good cleanse too. Not enough water for two showers. You should come help me conserve water." She winked.

Didn't have to tell me twice.

Salvage

This is the personal log, lieutenant Cherise Terone, assigned for salvage retrieval of casualties and cargo from the downed transport ship the Hunter-Gratzner on Planet Two of the M-344/G system. Of the several hundred passengers and crew who went down with the passenger transport, only two were reported to make it off world.

Only two. Such a lose of life. Bad enough it were the first incident but my findings indicate a geological survey was lost to this desert world as well under mysterious circumstances.

From interrogation of the two survivors, most of my useful information came from the older Muslim priest, who lost all four sons to this deadly world. He called the planet a cursed world, full of monsters. From the Imam al-Walid, we learned of the planet's dark secret, a lasting eclipse of all three of the desert planet's suns. The Imam spoke of the planet's wildlife, voracious predators, photosensitive, who hunted and killed multiple members of the crew when the eclipse caught up to them. The same celestial occurrence which claimed the lives of the missing geological survey team and their families.

I carried the Imam's parting words with me as I gathered my team for the recovery operation.

There is nothing on that world for you but bones and sand.

The Imam is correct, but it is part of our duty to bring the dead and their trifles home.

Planet Number Two of the M-344/G system

It is half a day's trek from the crash site of the Hunter-Gratzner to the remnants of the geological survey colony. Both locations are rife with death. Garreth swears he can hear their ghosts on the sand choked winds. Many of the ship's passengers died on impact, their mummified remains caught in final screams. Despite their terror filled last moments, their fate doesn't compare to the bone pit at the colony.

The Imam was wise to warn us of the pit, the dark recesses still festering with the winged hunters, the small vicious flocks that devoured many of the colonists. Garreth lead the charge, all too happy to burn them out. The high pitched shrieks of the dying predators filled him with a sick sort of glee. The whole affair left me feeling queasy.

We've spent the better part of three days gathering the remains and cargo at both sites, loading them into the Mariner's hold. There is incentive enough to gather up every strewn possession not swallowed up by the sands. Aside from a few burn outs of wildlife hiding in dark corners, the trip was proving to be uneventful.

"How many days do we have left till the next eclipse?" I wanted to be long gone from this cursed world by then. Harker is studying the planetary model left by geological colonists, comparing it to our own notes of the planet's celestial rhythms. Garreth is squinting down into the earth, perched on the edge of the whole left by the colony. He's itching for another opportunity to burn the terrestrials. Idiot is more likely to tip in. He's been twitchy since we landed. I half wonder if he's doping but Harker says he is eager to mete out a little vengeance, though my science officer won't enlighten me on the subject.

Harker is frowning down at the model, spinning it round and round, worrying his lips between his teeth.

"This model doesn't account for shifts in orbit," he said slowly. "In theory, we should still have a few days until the full dark falls again, but I suggest we pack up what we've found and haul ass out of dodge."

Few days in theory. No wonder he's so antsy. The moment we are off this rock, they will hit it with a burn order, labeling it a kill zone to discourage further colonies. His theory makes me rather uncomfortable as well despite a full cache of flamers and the aid of the sun. All our precautions and those vicious little monsters nearly ripped off Murphy's arm before Garreth torched them to the ground. I couldn't imagine them in their element or the larger monsters rumored to live beneath the surface.

"Leave, we can't leave yet," said Garreth, snapping up to look at us.

"Harker could you give us a minute?"

The big man sauntered out, leaving my alone with my second in command.

"Alright, Gary, spit it out. What's had your panties in a twist since we landed on this shit hole?"

Garreth sighed, leaning back from that yawning pit, his fingers flexed on the gun. "Not a what. A who." He ripped the dog tags off his neck, tossing them to me. The metal winked to gold in the flash of sunlight through the windows. I caught them one handed, rubbing a thumb over the metal to slick off the sand. One tag held Garreth's info but the other...

"Carolyn Fry," I said, my tone softer than I intended. We all knew about her, never expected her to meet her end out here. The Imam said she was brave to the end, giving them the final chance to survive. "Who was she to you, Gary?"

His dark head dropped further, until his chin rested on his chest. "Doesn't matter now. Her remains weren't among the bodies we found outside."

No they were not. There were a couple bodies still unaccounted for, the ones who'd been dragged below.

The Imam claimed that is what happened to the criminal Riddick, though even our superiors had trouble buying that one. A few of my men feared running into him out here, believing him the rare sort who could skulk out a living on this hostile world. As for Carolyn Fry, the holy man was clear on her fate. Pierced through the gut, and dragged off into the dark.

"Ah, Garreth, why did you even volunteer for this detail?"

"To bring her home," he muttered, giving a vicious kick to a piece of rock on the grit covered floor. The rock ricocheted off the wall, zig zagging into the pit with a hollow echo.

Harker burst into the room. "Lt. Terone! We have a problem."

Not words I wanted to hear when we were set to depart. "What is it?" I hadn't meant to snap, easing back on the throttle at Harker's expression. "The eclipse?"

"No, an unexpected issue," said Harker. "The ground is caving under our ship."

Garreth and I exchanged a glance, dashing out of the building. Sure enough, the Mariner was sinking into the earth.

"What the hell? Tell the men to get the engines hot and humming. We need to move now!"

The effort was too little, too late. The ground rumbled and cracked, the Mariner sinking until it was half buried, wedged in the rock, nigh impossible to fly out.

"How did this happen? Send out a distress signal now! I want a damage report."

The crew poured out the nearest port, a startled ant hill, taking a head count.

After dancing around the settled ship for a few teeth grinding hours, Harker sidled up next to me.

"It appears there is a honeycomb structure of caves beneath us. The concentrated weight of the Mariner caused enough stress fractures to sink through," he said, handing me a digitized read out. "Even if we dump weight, it might not be enough to pull us out of the hole."

"That's fair disturbing, Harker, especially since I aim to be off this rock before the suns start setting."

"Not nearly so disturbing as this," he said, ushering me to a nearby crack. Even before he tipped his light, I could hear the movement, the rushing noises of things moving in the dark. They scattered from the light but I still caught flashes, of wedge shaped heads, lithe bodies and teeth, so many teeth.

"Can they...can they get into the ship?"

"I don't believe so," said Harker. "The hull integrity is sound though-"

The ground creaked beneath us. Spiderweb cracks shot out from the ship, shifting the sand beneath our feet.

"Everyone move," I shouted as a chunk of ground gave way beneath their feet. My men tumbled into the dark, including Garreth. Our eyes met the moment the ground gave way.

For a moment, all was silent, my heart beating furiously in my chest. The second I heard their yells I sprang into action, skidding to a halt at the edge of the hole.

"Stay in the light," I screamed at them, gesturing frantically at Harker and the others to break out repel gear and torches. The men huddled in the weak stream of light pouring down on them, but it wasn't enough, not enough to protect them all. The first silenced scream chilled my blood.

"Torches, they need torches, lanterns, anything that will give off light," I shouted, dropping my own rifle with light into Garreth's upraised arms. They were roughly thirty feet down, but the distance was deadly. Another gurgling scream echoed from below as the monsters swarmed around them, picking them off one by one.

Harker slid beside me, dropping two more rifles down the hole. Shouts and gun fire, flashes and sparks, bullets and blood, with nothing to do but wait for the repel gear and hope there were still men to save. The wounded Murphy went down, the sent of his already injury arm driving the creatures into a frenzy. One risked the light to snap him up, separating the arm from his body while he was still alive.

"Please hurry with the gear," I whispered, clutching the sand beneath my fingers. After a small eternity Harker and another were fitting me into a harness, lowering me down. I shot the ones I could see as I dropped, screaming for the survivors to fall in to the center. The moment my boots touched the stone I lit a flare, dropping it at our feet to keep the beasts at bay.

I struggled out of my gear, loading up the first man to be hauled out before I risked taking in the sight of them.

My breath caught in my throat. There were thousands, pacing at the edge of the light, swarming up the walls, crawling over each other as they scented the blood in the air. There were sounds of scuffle through the thick of them, high pitched screeches wrought with wet tears as they fought over freshly won meals...

My stomach rolled. They fought over the remains of my men. How would I recover their bones for their families?

I shot into the thick of them, bullets and light forcing them to momentarily scatter, revealing the half eaten corpse of Murphy. His face was already gone, though the stump of his arm remained.

I screamed and shot until my clip was empty.

Garreth pulled me back into the center, guarding my flank as the others above continued to haul the men out of this hell hole.

"Not worth dying Cherise," he murmured in my ear, keeping me calm as the number whittled down to the two of us. Garreth grasped the lowered harness. "Come on, we'll ride out together."

He reached for me, but his eyes were elsewhere. I followed his gaze, spotting the glint of dog tags, the bits of metal blood stained and corroded. Not one of my men. They hovered at the edge of the light, far too close to snatching distance for the creatures.

"You listen to me," I said, turning to face him. "Those aren't worth dying for either, Gary. Now you strap into that harness and we will get out of this pit."

The words were slow to register. I could read the determined mien, his eyes glinting, ready to dive for a rusted string of metal. I clocked him across the jaw.

"Strap yourself in, soldier," I snarled at him, nudging the muzzle of my empty rifle beneath his chin. He was so caught up he forgot I was out of bullets.

"They could be hers," his eyes pleaded with me. I scowled at him.

"Those buggers will spear you the moment you get in reach."

I squinted at the unearthed tags, making a decision I wasn't sure of as I scuffed forward two steps, reaching a toe for them.

Garreth yanked me back as black spear like appendage stabbed the air I just occupied.

"Are you insane," he shouted at me. "Didn't you just finish explaining to me what a piss poor idea it was to nab them?"

"For you, idiot," I said, dangling the dog tags in his face. "I needed your reflexes to make sure I wasn't kebabbed."

"I've never been so tempted to throttle a superior officer," he muttered, taking the tags from me. He swiped off the grime and rust on his shirt best he could, and held them up to the light.

"They hers?"

He nodded, wrapping an arm around me before tugging on the repel line. "Let's get out of this pit, yeah."

I clung to him as we rose, my eyes glued to the swarming mass of creatures on the wall. So many of them, so many still hungry. I didn't take my eyes from them until Harker hooked an arm around my waist and pulled me free.

Sand never felt so good beneath my fingers. "How many did we lose down there?"

"Five, including Murphy," said Harker.

I nodded, taking a breath for their loss. It would be a hard conversation with their loved ones. "Are we any closer to extracting the Mariner from the earth?"

"A distress call has been sent out. We can expect a ship within one to two cycles tops."

I rose to my knees, placing a hand on Garreth's shoulder. He was still staring down at the tags, rubbing his fingers over the eroded lettering over and over. He was so certain they were the lost Carolyn Fry's but who knows how many those creatures dragged into the dark below.

The geological survey team, the survivors of the Hunter-Gratzner, and now my men. This world claimed so many lives. I lifted my face to its suns, wishing for nothing more than a hot bath and to be far away from this cursed world. I blinked at the sky.

"Harker, what do you see?"

Harker looked up, paling at the celestial alignment in the sky. "It appears my calculations were incorrect. We don't have a matter of days."

A planet rose on the horizon, heralding the oncoming eclipse. In the hole, the creatures chattered, eager for the oncoming night.

The End

Literally, Orange

The Year: 2259

Location: Temple of Science Fiction

The Abductions and Outbreaks Quadrant

Sid was adept at his job. It was not a hard one. As a member of the Temple's custodial staff, his primary task was sweeping the lengthy hallway of the A and O Quadrant. The rooms were to be left alone, they didn't even trust him with a key to any of the multitude of locked doors. Not that he wanted one after listening to muffled screams and gun fire day in and day out. A and O was a rather violent section, he usually worked with his sound node on, listening to the screeching vintage classics of 20th century British Punk Rock. He was quite fond of the music, though he had the unfortunate habit of randomly erupting into a rousing session of broom guitar.

A session which the Quadrant's head Ambassador stumbled upon during his rounds.

"Recruit, about face!"

Sid dropped his broom, frantically flickering at his sound node as he turned to the irate Ambassador, eyeballing the filled in W, outlined in blue, tattooed on the man's forehead. Embarrassment burned the back of his neck as he felt the scrutinizing glare of the ambassador appraise his own tattoo. Five years in temple service and Sid was still a mere 'Outliner'.

"Show me your profile plate!" The man snapped, holding out one chalk white hand. Pasty complexion, the sign of the upper crust, the big wigs that raked in the high counts, and never saw more than a few seconds of sunlight a month.

Cringing, Sid yanked on the chain round his neck, lifting a plate slightly bigger than his hand that contained all the important details of his existence. He handed it over to the Ambassador, bracing himself for the inevitable chuckle and demeaning appraisal.

_Idiot_ , he should have known better than to start dancing around like a fool this time of night. Anyone passing by wouldn't have given him a second glance if he wasn't fondling his broom like a drunken lead guitarist.

"Hmmm, ah yes," the Ambassador squinted at the minuscule lettering. "User number 42385854..." He continued to rattle off a lengthy string of numbers. "Says here you have over 30 P.W.'s" He raised a brow, swiping a bony index finger across the plate. It whirred softly, slowly displaying the accumulation of Sid's life work. He winced at the whirring, he needed to bring the damn thing in for maintenance and a solid clean out.

The Ambassador made another show of squinting at the screen, before he gave a ragged sigh and slid a pair of thick goggles down from the top of his head to perch comically on his nose. The man must be blind as a naked mole rat.

"Ah, yes, here we are. Several single parts of thrash poetry, a few poorly updated attempts at extraterrestrial abductions. Goodness, these haven't been tinkered with in months. Barely a dozen views between them." His head snapped up. "Improper use of 'your' directly in the blurbs." He clucked his tongue as if Sid committed a hate crime rather than a mere misdemeanor. Still, he kicked himself, a grammar crime meant a night in the penalty box, editing boy band fan fiction. He shuddered, trying to come up with a pitiful story to soften the Ambassador's heart to him.

"My mum's been sick, sir, I've been pulling double shifts to keep her feed live." Sid dropped his head, praying his superior bought it.

"Well, see that you clean up that language, boy, or it's the box for you." The man's disdain was clear as he fished a massive ring of keys from the depths of his sky blue robes. "Now, if you would excuse me." He turned his back to Sid, flipping through keys outside one of the dozens of black doors. Not wanting to arouse another lecture or be punished, Sid resumed sweeping, glancing at the muttering Ambassador out of the corner of his eye. A few muffled laser blasts emitted from behind the thick door.

_What could he possibly want from there?_ Sweep, sweep, sweep. _It had to be one of the most violent entries in the quadrant_.

"Ah ha," mumbled the Ambassador, at last selecting a key identical to the six dozen on the ring. Despite its identical appearance, it seemed to be the right one, unlocking the door with a click. Sid found himself unconsciously shuffling to the left.

"There we are," said the Ambassador, opening the door outward.

A flash of neon blue light flared outward. The man's head vanished in a fine red mist, his body still vertical holding the door propped open as an unholy roar poured into the hall.

Sid dropped his broom for the second time that day.

The Ambassador's body began to fall forward where it would wedge the door wide open. This was not in Sid's best interests as another roar vibrated the walls. A second flare of blue light flashed through, leaving a long burned gash in the opposite wall. Fantastic, now he'd have to paint tonight as well.

Snagging the headless corpse by the back of his blue robes, Sid heaved him out of the doorway, getting a glimpse inside. The sight made his intestines quiver. His bladder clenched, threatening to dribble in his trousers. He slammed the door shut before that _thing_ got any closer.

"Don't think about it too hard, boyo," he told himself, ignoring the desperation in his voice. He glanced down to the far more pleasant sight of the headless body, wondering what the hell he would do now, other than get a mop. An accident report seemed a bit callous but the man was already dead.

Sighing, he yanked his profile plate up, impatiently tapping at it to pull up the message center to headquarters. Tap, tap, tap. He submitted his report, short, concise, to the point, and no visible grammatical offenses.

There was a problem posting your report.

The message flashed at him. His brow scrunched up as he repeated the effort, until the W tattoo was little more than a squiggle of frustration. After nine attempts, grinding his teeth, he pulled up the profile of his cousin, attempting to send a personal message. The man had a far cushier job in the Steampunk quadrant.

Verne2490: What is it Sid?

ViciousSid86: Ah yes, I seem to have a situation and the reports are borked again. Any advice for getting rid of a body?

Verne2490:....Your joking right?

ViciousSid86: That's an improper use of 'your'

Verne2490: RIGHT?

ViciousSid86: No, I am in a pickle cuz. One of the blue robes opened a door in my quadrant and is now quite dead. The report won't go through. I don't want someone to stumble on the two of us.

Verne2490: Are you sure he isn't just unconscious?

Sid glanced down at the headless corpse quietly oozing on his normally pristine floor.

ViciousSid86: Yeah, I don't think he's sleeping this one off.

There was a long pause before his cousin responded, making him sweat.

Verne2490: I'll be there in five minutes.

There was little more Sid could do other than put some distance between himself and the body. If anyone stumbled upon them before his cousin arrived, he planned to feign surprise.

Footsteps squeaked and thudded up the hall in a mad dash. He tensed, relief singing through his veins as Verne skidded around the corner, his jaw dropping at the sight of the Ambassador.

"Holy Tesla, what the hell happened?"

"Nice to see you, too," Sid jerked his chin in the direction of the murderous room. "He opened that one. Not for two seconds before his melon got blasted clean off."

Verne frowned. "What the hell would he want in there? It's the deadliest entry in this quadrant."

"I know, right!"

His cousin pulled his own profile plate up, tapping the screen. Sid leaned on his broom watching him, not all that surprised when he dropped it with a few colorful swears. "They must be doing another round of maintenance."

Sid pursed his lips. "Sure they are. Meanwhile, what the hell are we supposed to do with this guy?" He nudged the Ambassador with a toe, realizing he didn't even know the man's name. Gingerly, he squatted down beside the body, trying to find the profile plate chain without actually touching him.

"What are you doing?" His cousin snapped. "Are you trying to get yourself arrested? Or worse, banned?"

"Oh, don't get your suspenders in a twist, I'm looking for his I.D." Odd, the man had the massive ring of keys on him, but no profile? Did all the blue robes know each other on sight? There were thousands of them, despite all the modern upgrades and brain enhancements, no one's memory was that good. "Where the hell is it?" Sid was seconds from stripping the body when his cousin seized him by the shoulders.

"Come on, it's only a matter of time before another one wanders on down here." He started tugging Sid away from the scene, puzzled when he met resistance.

"I can't just leave my shift. They'll know I was here." Sid eyed the ring of keys. "We should dump the body."

"Are you out of your ever-loving mind?" Verne's shout echoed through the suddenly silent hall, as if the myriad of creatures behind the closed doors held their collective breath.

"This A and O, we have lasers, flesh eating plagues, ravenous undead, and questionable goo that dissolves anything it touches. This is the perfect place to vanish a corpse," Sid insisted, scooping up the key ring. He looked for any discerning markers to separate them, seeing the minute numbers etched on each handle. His cousin sputtered behind him, trying to come up with a counter argument. With the report system down, any authority figures bumping into them would mean Sid was well and truly boned. His punishment would make the penalty box look like a fevered wet dream.

"Fine," Verne grumbled, "which one should we stash him in."

"Let's try this one."

An hour later, Verne and Sid sat panting outside the last door they opened. Both men sported a variety of burns, scratches, cuts, and Verne sported a gangrenous looking bite mark on his left shoulder. They'd opened over a dozen doors, seen enough nightmare fodder to interrupt their sleep for weeks, and the body of the Ambassador continued to keep them company.

"You should get that looked at," said Sid, pointing to the bite.

"Oh shut up." Verne pushed himself to his feet, kicking the corpse for good measure.

"Oi!"

Both of their heads snapped up at the shout. A second blue robe gaped at them, his wide eyed gaze darting between them and the body.

"Oh sh-"

"Halt, by Order of the Watt!" The newcomer shouted, lifting his profile plate to push a small red button on the side. The normally low lighting of the hall flared, spotlights falling on Sid, Verne, and the deceased Ambassador. The two men clung to each other in full out panic as a combination of blue robes and figures in bright orange suits with white pinstripes poured into the hall, surrounding them. The suits each had a screen implanted in their forearms for immediate access to the mainframe, their eyes long ago replaced by computerized screens suited for their line of work. Sid watched them take in the scene, his body paralyzed by fear. Not just Ambassadors, they were surrounded by Admins.

"I'm sorry I pulled you into this," he whispered. Verne was too shell shocked to answer.

One of the Admins stepped forward. "What happened here, gentlemen?"

They were doomed. Sid refused to let his cousin take the fall for coming to his aid. He gently pried Verne's hands off his biceps, turning to face his superior, even if it was a bit difficult to look in those freaky eyes of his.

"Well you see," he said, picking up his broom. "It happened like this..."

By the end of his story, he was surrounded by a circle of stunned people, their tattooed W's scrunched up in a series of squiggles that would be comical if his life didn't hang in the balance. These were the people who could make his existence vanish in the blink of an eye, if they were so inclined. He finished, sweat now soaking his backside in a highly unpleasant manner.

The Admins glanced between each other and the body, clearly at a loss with how to proceed.

"We need to call the Big Guy," one of them finally piped up in an oddly subdued tone. There was a collective cringe between the suits.

"You know how he hates to be dragged out of the Pub this time of night," said another, "maybe we should just erase this idiot and be done with it."

Sid felt a trickle of urine escape down his pant leg.

Another Admin groaned. "That is far too much bloody paperwork, for him and us. Call him, this thing is already starting to stink." He gave Verne a speculative eye. "And maybe call a medic for this one. I think that bite's a bit infected."

"Oh gods, not another literary plague. It took us weeks to clean up the last one. Quarantine that bugger."

A pair of the blue robes hauled Verne away by the tips of his elbows, none of them looking too thrilled to touch him. He looked back at Sid, wild eyed and scared.

"Avenge me!" He squeaked, disappearing around the corner.

That left Sid alone with the cluster of his superiors. The lot of them shuffled about awkwardly, tidbits of idle conversation sparking and dying before one of them finally coughed.

"Here he comes, folks. Look lively."

_As opposed to the corpse on the floor?_ Sid kept the thought to himself, immediately forgetting it as a damn legend knuckled into view.

There were whispered rumors he'd existed in the first days of the great W, before the rise of the Empire, before the genre temples, brain function downloads, and the unbreakable laws of grammar. He'd lived in a time before the true digital age, an ancient profile being their only guide when a new form was created to host his higher brain functions. However, unlike the simian inspiration of his form, the modern version of the Big Guy, like the W tattooed across his rather hairy chest, was bright orange.

Literally, Orange.

Coupled with the wisdom of ages in his eyes, the effect was settling.

Approaching the headless Ambassador on all fours, the Big Guy took in the grisly scene with a barely audible 'Ook', shaking his shaggy head in disgust. He glared at the group of nervous Admins.

"This is why I was dragged away from Trivia night?"

Sid blinked in surprise at the cultured voice, which still somehow fit the vessel it emerged from. The Admins proceeded to bob their heads in apology, all speaking at once. He silenced them with a wave of one hairy arm.

"Enough. You," he pointed to Sid, "explain what happened here."

Startled by the order, Sid did just that, performing the whole story from the first air guitar riff to the last open door fiasco. The Big Guy nodded sagely throughout the story, scratching his chin.

"I see. No profile plate you say?"

"No sir," yelped Sid, producing the ring of keys. "All he had on him were these."

A light of understanding flared in those deep-set brown eyes. The Big Guy plucked the key ring from Sid's unresisting hands.

Uncertain what would happen next, Sid clung to his broom, waiting for his sentence to be handed out.

"Why don't you cut your shift short tonight, ViciousSid86?"

He dropped the damn broom for the third time that night.

"Sir?" He stammered.

The Big Guy looked at him, the wrinkles doubling on his forehead. "Oh, you're free to go, lad." He lifted a hand to stifle the whining protests of the others. "However in the future, if you have trouble filing a report, try changing the format a bit before you call cousin Verne. Now, off you get."

Sid didn't need more encouragement, sprinting away with the songs of angels echoing in his ears. He'd never complain about his job again.

The Admins turned on the Big Guy with shuttered 'what gives' expressions, none of them quite willing to voice the question. He rolled his eyes.

"Oh for the love of--guys, it was Gerald. He was dismissed from his position this morning due to a massive conduct violation." The Big Guy turned to go.

"Wh-what violation sir?" One of the Admins piped up, quickly ducking back into the group to avoid being singled out.

"What else, another fucking rant book," said the Big Guy, "now if you will excuse me, there is a bowl of peanuts and a pint waiting for me. And get someone in here to clean up this mess." He tossed the ring of keys to the closest Admin, rapidly knuckling out of sight.

The group looked at one another.

"Should...should we call the janitor back in?"

The Admin pondered the ring of keys in his hands. "We could always try one of the doors."

The End

When Pigs Fly Coach

Orwell knew it was going to be a wretched day when the hot slop came hurtling at him over the diner counter.

There was a beat of silence among the diners, wincing in sympathy for the demise of a rather nice trouser and waistcoat to the oozing splotch of greasy food before they returned to their plates and general conversation. Orwell sighed, there wasn't much else he could do about the situation now, not with hot grease seeping into the fine silk weave of his tailored vest. Lucy was appalled, attempting to sop at the mess with her already stained apron.

"I am so sorry, Mr. Speck," she babbled, wobbling on too thin heels around him until he was certain one more turn would send her toppling to the ground.

"It's quite all right dear," he said, trying to keep the grind of his back teeth out of his voice. Lucy had impeccable service and as a rule was genuinely kind to him, it was just his luck today. He missed the first tram of the day, meaning he couldn't stop for the morning paper and breakfast. Food was more important so he'd opted straight for the diner. Barely three bites into his meal and he was dripping. The grease mingled with the morning sweat brought on by the crowded tram, leaving the faint odor of hot garbage.

There was no time to run home and change, not if he was to catch his flight, which meant he would perform his inspection smelling like a landfill.

"At least let me comp you the meal, sir," said Lucy. Perhaps this wouldn't be such a bad day after all.

"Thank, my dear, that would be most helpful," he said, catching sight of the time. The traitorous hands indicated he had barely half an hour to trot to the station. Leaping up with an indignant squeal, he bade Lucy an apologetic farewell and raced off, pattering along the cobblestones at top speed.

He should have stayed in bed, wrapped in his blankets.

The central station was abuzz, passengers packed snout to tail as they made their way through ticketing and customs. Orwell skidded into the express line, fumbling for his official papers in his vest pocket, dismayed by the smear of grease over the city seal. Oh, dear. Mr. Perkins would have a conniption when he saw the state of his paperwork.

He placed them before the porter, apologizing for their condition as he launched into the breakfast fiasco.

"And then the poor girl slipped an a stray peel and--"

"Please place your hand here," said the porter, his expression one of boredom.

"Oh, er..." Orwell placed his hand beneath the scanner, praying Mrs. Tally properly updated his information for the system.

The porter frowned at the screen. "I'm afraid there was a discrepancy in setting up your accommodations Inspector....Speck. In light of that, we unfortunately overbooked first class. We can still place you on the waiting flight, but I am afraid you shall have to take a coach seat."

Truly, it was a wretched day.

A flight attendant in a too small skirt and jacket led him through the ship, giving him a longing glimpse of the roomy seating arrangements and private booths contained in first class. The aisle abruptly narrowed, forcing both of them to squeeze their combined bulk into the trough lined benches. Orwell sneered at the worn bench, the economy seating far below the cleanliness standards of the first class. He heaved himself to the window, because he'd be damned if this already piss poor arrangement forced him to the middle of the bench. Pouting he kept his gaze out the circular window, ignoring the grunts and snorts of the other passengers packing themselves in like fish in a tin. His beady eyes rolled as a gentleman who required the space of the first class rolled himself in next to Orwell, his bulk smooshing the poor inspector's face against the concave bubble of glass. Orwell gave a short squeal of protest.

"Oh, sorry, sorry," sputtered the portly gentleman, a fleck of spittle landing on Orwell's soiled vest.

The inspector bit back on his angry retort, unwilling to start a row with the slob as the ship's engines kicked into gear. A lurch in his stomach and they were air born, the city falling away beneath them as the dirigible's engines puffed and bellowed to gain the necessary height for the wall.

The portly gentleman beside him leaned into him. "Hydrogen power, eh? Safest way to travel, if I do say so myself."

_Oh no,_ thought Orwell, a conversationalist. He could see the trap waiting for him. Don't answer, don't answer! Luckily, the ship crested the city wall, giving his neighbor a distraction.

"By god," murmured the fat gentleman.

Ah ha, a first time traveler. One could always tell by the reaction to what lay over the wall. Orwell ignored the murmuring around him and looked down at the crawling mass. These were the non-contained ones, a writhing mess of bodies, fighting, mating, eating, and everything in between. It was a miracle the wall kept them at bay, or they would spill into the streets of his city, consuming everything in sight. That was their nature, and despite the various methods of pest control the government employed to keep the horde in check, every few years their numbers would ramp up again. He wondered where creation went wrong to produce such a being.

His destination in one of the walled central regions of the country made a point to study them, to gauge their weaknesses and strengths, if any. The Genos Facility produced many experiments on the creatures. One of the more troubling theories was the possibility of the horde possessing untapped intelligence. A worrisome theory for sure, any government official worth his salt would quiver in his boots at the thought of an organized horde.

Orwell's superior claimed the Genos Facility submitted several lax reports of their latest round of experiments, prompting a 'surprise' inspection. He snorted at the thought. Undoubtedly it was more of a surprise for him than it was for Genos. He was certain he would be a laughingstock among those white coats when he should up rumpled and covered in slop. The thought made him grind his teeth until the ship landed in the central region.

If one thought the coastal region was crowded, central felt like an unending cattle drive. His destination was on the direct opposite side of the region, hugging central's far wall right at their back door.

By the time Orwell was spat out by the herd at the Genos Facility gate, he was even more of a hot mess, muttering darkly to himself when there was no guard to greet him. He harumped and stumped about t he gate for half an hour before ducking under the post and stomping for the front door.

The grounds were eerily silent. Through the front glass panes, he caught a glimpse of the lobby desk, also empty. What was going on here?

Orwell nosed his way inside, his steps clicking on the linoleum floor as he walked through the halls. Not a soul in sight. A right puzzle to be sure until he caught sight of a suspicious rust colored smudge along the wall. The short bristles along his back stood on end as he slowed his progress, peering around corners before he took them. A strange smell permeated the air, teasing his nostrils with a scent that made him salivate as much as it disgusted him. Something was terribly wrong here.

Orwell froze at sound of footsteps, except these steps were flat, slapping noises, fleshy noises. He backed against the wall, ready to bolt when she came around the corner.

At least he thought it was a female. He'd never been so close to one of the horde before, never mind one of their young. She couldn't have been more than four feet tall, with long wild blonde hair that fell in fat curls down to her waist. She rubbed her eyes with one hand, cradling, holding a crispy strip of meat in her other that she nibbled as she walked. She stopped when she saw Orwell.

"Hullo Mr. Piggy," she said, nibbling the strip of meat with a grin.

It spoke! Orwell blinked at the youngling, shocked into temporary silence as they studied one another. There were more rust stains on the girl's plain cotton gown, and her fingernails were suspiciously dirty.

"Um, hello little one," he paused, at a loss with how to proceed. Clearly the facility was more lax than his superiors feared, if their subjects were wandering the halls in unseemly get ups. "Pardon, where are your handlers?"

He winced at her frown; she clearly didn't appreciate the word. Orwell groaned internally. Of all the theories that could have been right, Genos had to be right about the horde animals' supposed intelligence.

"They aren't around anymore," said the small female, nibbling on her meal with a creepy smile. He could smell it now. It gave off the same tantalizing and nauseating smell that wafted through the halls.

"What _are_ you eating?"

Her grin grew wider. "Bacon."

Orwell frowned, confused. What on Earth was bacon? The small female crouched in front of him, ripping a chunk of the meat away with small white teeth. She chewed it with relish before looking him dead in the eye.

"Oink oink," she said.

Cold terror washed down his spine as clarity stole over him. Orwell backed away from the female, his feet clicking on the ground. He was so mindless of his direction he bumped into a metal waste bin, knocking it over. The metallic clang echoed down the hall as its contents emptied across the linoleum.

A head spilled out, leaving a smear of blood along the floor as it came to a rest at Orwell's feet.

"Oh!" Some sick bastard stuck an apple core in the head's mouth. Orwell managed to tear his eyes away from the grisly sight as the hall filled with the sound of rushing thumps.

"I would run now, Mr. Pig," said the little female, dispassionately prodding the head with her toe. Orwell didn't need to be told twice. He bolted down the winding halls, trying to find his way back to the entrance. He had to tell someone! He had to alert the authorities! How many bloody test subjects did Genos house in this facility? How had they gotten the upper hand on trained scientists? Were they really as intelligent as the scientists claimed?

Orwell skidded and tripped along the halls, realizing he was thoroughly lost in the facility's endless maze of identical hallways. It couldn't get worse than this, he bemoaned to himself, turning another corner.

He spoke too soon, cursing the laws of the universe that rose to the unspoken challenge. Instead of finding the front door, Orwell managed to find the back. It took the space of glance to understand what happened to Genos facility. They had played with fire, drilling a hole into the wall to extract subjects directly from the other side instead of waiting for them to be properly tagged and caught in the wild. The shielding doors to the tunnel hung off their hinges, busted open, giving the horde a direct route inside.

Where they devoured the Genos staff.

The yard was crawling with them, lazily gnawing on the porcine remains of the wall guards. A swarm of humans who would kill and devour him in a heart beat. Who would descend on central to consume it all.

Orwell backed away, praying they didn't notice him, praying just once, something about this disaster of a day went right. He backed right into another damn trash bin.

Every shaggy head swiveled in his direction, licking their lips at the sight of him. Orwell squealed and ran for it, the horde of humans hot on his heels.

It was a very wretched day.

The End?

Drifters

The Dregs raided the Nursery again.

The fifth time in as many cycles, though who was keeping track on this derelict piece of junk? Those idiots had no sense of preservation, no greater insight than they own little war games. They'd taken four this time, all boys, none of them older than ten. Start them young, young enough to mold, young enough to get them wild and savage before they unleashed them into the gladiatorial section. And too young to last more than one or two fights. Even if they did survive, who'd want to willingly mate with whatever vicious little cur was left.

I sucked on my teeth, looking at the wreck of the Nursery unit. The remaining children were cowering in the bunker, sealed off, still too scared to put in the codes and let me in. I'd have to bribe my way in eventually but I was sick of this. The Nursery was supposed to be a neutral zone, a safe zone, free from the games and other bloody sundries the various gangs of the ship participated in. The Nursery was given a pass and recruitment was supposed to be off limits until the kids were at least sixteen and able to make choices of their own free will.

I toed the shattered interface of a nutritionist bot, some of the pieces so damaged it would be hell to fix. My fists clenched at my sides. I didn't usually get involved with the inter-gang politics, if they left us alone I left them alone, but the Dregs had continually violated the tenuous peace we had brokered. Snatching kids, breaking vital equipment, and sowing fear, each time I was the one who cleaned up the mess. Who fixed equipment. Who wheedled and traded liquor and med packs for the taken ones. Because the Dregs needed supplies more than they needed fighters, but they always kept one or two and the loss hit the kids harder each time.

It was time to go to Donovan.

A last resort, one I loathed to take because he always took more than he helped but I was charged with securing the next generation and I would be the one who took the blame if they were all popped off by one of the more unruly gangs on the ship.

Astrid came up behind me, hovering by my shoulder as she surveyed the damage. "The kids make it into the bunker?"

"Most of them," I said, tapping a code on the door. A tentative knock answered me before the bunker locked clicked open. "Get them cleaned up and settled. I'm off to see Donovan."

Astrid gaped at me. "Anika, is that necessary?"

I swallowed down the sharper retort. "The Dregs have hit us repeatedly. Ever since the change in leadership. I have to go to Donovan before they completely destroy the nursery," I took a breath. "Even if it means throwing my lot into the games."

If my resolve wavered all I needed was one peek into the bunker at the wan faces of the remaining kids, mostly girls now, they features etched by fear.

I left them in Astrid and the others capable hands as I made for the Nursery's hatch that opened onto the rest of the ship.

The corridors were quiet this time of day, fitting after such a recent raid. I saw only a few haggard traders and scarred veterans as I strolled along, casual like, as if I wasn't about to seek an audience with the head of the ship. The meanest man alive, someone who'd survived over a decade in the twisting hazards of the gladiatorial section. It took a certain kind of individual to survive so long in such a dangerous place and then to seize a sort of leadership over all the various gangs and clans that inhabited the ship, bullying them to loosely follow a set of laws.

A man I was about to beg for help. To secure the future, to protect the innocent. Did those ideals matter to a man like him anymore? Did they ever? I wasn't sure. I hadn't dealt much with Donovan as I had his predecessor, a man I'd butt heads with repeatedly and gotten into more than one fist fight with to secure the general safety of the ship's children. After all, what future did we have, if we squandered our youth on petty bloody games.

It was a hard idea to drill into the head of a born criminal.

But we were all criminals in one way or another. Not like we were the last hope for humanity or any such noble venture. We were all Dregs, cast offs, leftovers, the unwanted element. We were the expendable ones. That was why they'd corralled us up and launched us off on the Hive, a fully equipped if outdated ship built for decades of travel. A dangerous mission of expansion, into an uncharted system. Instead of risking their best and brightest, they'd thrown the Hive here. It wouldn't be the first time criminals colonized new grounds.

The problem was the Hive itself.

The newer ships had stasis pods and hyper drives. Not so with the Hive. It was what made the Nursery such a vital part of the ship. Most of us would never set foot on solid earth again. And that lack of containment is also why the Hive eventually succumbed to the anarchistic system it existed under now.

Ruled by bloody games and bloodier laws. It didn't matter. It was my task to give the ship's children, the few who survived to their first breath, as much of a resemblance of childhood as was possible in this existence. The raids were making that impossible. The birth rate of the Hive was too low to allow it.

I knew I was drawing closer to my destination but the guards posted at each hatchway. Mean sons of bitches who leered at me as I passed. It was only the obviously shiv strapped to my thigh that kept their paws off me.

Krellik, Donovan's second in command, stood outside the door to the main suite. Krellik was one of the squad who'd survived at their leader's side for years in the games, broadcasted for all the ship to see. They were celebrities in a way, impossible not to recognize, unlike me.

"I need to see Donovan," I said, folding my arms to keep my hands from shaking.

Krellik eyed me up and down, raising an eyebrow at my diminutive form. "What's a Nanny like you doing here?"

I smiled at him sweetly. "If you could handle it for me, I wouldn't be asking to see your boss." The smile fell from my face. "Please, it is a matter concerning the Nursery."

He was slow to move, slow enough to make me grit my teeth but it was a reminder of my reliance on his goodwill as he entered the suite to announce my presence.

After a few more teeth grinding moments Krellik poked his head out, his expression unfathomable as he gestured me in. I squeezed past him, unsurprised when he slid the hatch back in place behind me, leaving me alone with his boss.

Donovan's suite was massive and ill lit, as if the man strived for the dark. It was also completely trashed. Broken bits of machinery, glass and other debris crackled under my feet. Why would he choose to live like this? He was the most powerful man on the ship. I eventually found him, stumbling my way through the dark, my presence long announced by the crack and crunch of my footsteps. He was waiting for me, hands folded in front of him as he sat, relaxed and composed on a long bench.

I was not ready for my first sight of him.

He'd be handsome but for the scars. Or handsome despite them, a lattice work that tattooed the side of his face with the grim reminder of his roots. I wasn't expecting someone so calm, not after the wreck of the room.

"What brings a Nanny to my rooms?" His voice was soft, as casual and cool as the rest of him, his tone unhurried. I had a feeling he knew exactly why I was here. Actually he had to know why I was here. Nothing happened on this ship without his knowledge but while there were laws of a sort, they weren't necessarily followed and settling matters on your own was encouraged.

I had been settling on my own for several cycles but there was only so much I could do. So many bargains I could strike with the bull headed Dregs. Each time I lost one or two. Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad if the raids weren't so frequent.

"I have come to file a formal complaint on the Dregs of the Underbelly." The Underbelly was the labyrinth of service tunnels that comprised the lowest levels of the ship and was Dreg central. They existed like sewer rats.

"My, my, what have they done to provoke a formal complaint?"

Formal complaints were serious matters. It was a call for Donovan's interference, which always came with a steep price and always resulted in death. A lot of death. It was a price I came here willing to pay, no matter what he demanded of me.

I gave him a sharp look. "I think you know why."

His eyes turned considering as he reached for a decanter. "Sit, have a drink with me. Let us discuss terms."

It was too easy. Too simple. Donovan knew exactly what the Dregs were doing. He knew one of the Nannies would show up to ask his favor eventually. I sank on the bench beside him, accepting the cup of liquor he offered, harsh as engine degreaser but it helped steady my nerves.

"What do you want?" The question came out harsher than I intended but I felt played. I'd been afraid to come here for very different reasons but now I felt lured in.

"That is not as important as what you want. How severe a punishment do you wish to mete out? Do you want the Dregs culled from the ship? Do you want their leader tossed out the nearest air lock? Perhaps you wish to make an example of them in the games?" He lazily twirled the decanter in his hands as he spoke so casually of killing.

We were all criminals aboard the Hive, but crime is a board spectrum and not all of us were murders or rapists. Some of us were just desperate thieves. It was why I'd signed on to be a Nanny. It was a useful occupation and it kept me out of the games.

I took another sip of my drink, feeling the burn in the pit of my stomach. "What price would you demand if I just wanted the raids to end?" I looked up at him, trying to gauge his reaction as I spoke. "There are so many years before we see a rock worth inhabiting. Too many years to fill with nothing but blood games. Do you mean to squander the children born on this ship in pointless deaths? To snuff out what future we have?"

A small smirk played on his lips, causing the burn in my stomach to freeze over. "You're an optimist. You truly believe we were sent out here with any true chance of survival. Do you honestly believe this ship won't disintegrate at the first atmosphere it hits?"

It was the unspoken fear of everyone on this ship. The true purpose of our "mission", the cosmic joke of it. A ship of criminals, sent to drift through the stars until they returned to the dust.

"So you would condemn innocents to the games for your cynical outlook?" Donovan might be right in his view of my optimism but it was what I clung to in order to survive this place. It was the reason I went on, the reason I fought tooth and nail for the Hive's children. He seemed to read those emotions in my face as he shifted, looking me over.

"Yet there are so very few children who make it to the Nursery," he murmured. His eyes scanned the length of my body, making me very aware I was a woman alone in his quarters and how easily he could over power me.

"Is that any surprise to you when you have so few 'laws' to protect them?"

The smirk on his face widened. "This Nursery of yours, what do you teach the children?"

His question caught me off guard but only for a moment. "We teach them everything we can about maintaining the ship"

He looked surprised by my answer, giving me the courage to continue. "Who do you keeps this place running? I've spent nearly fifteen years raising the next generation. I kept them safe as I could until they are in their teens. Until they are pressed with the choice to join the games or do something useful. Some go to the games, but most of them joined the maintenance and upkeep of this ship. So while your ilk have enjoyed your blood sport, the children made sure this ship kept going. The Nursery is worth protecting."

Donovan sat in silence, turning my words over. After several long moments of silence he spoke. "Return to your Nursery, comfort your children. I will ensure the Dregs do not bother you again."

I stood to go but I knew I wouldn't get out that easy. "And the payment?"

He waved a dismissive hand. "I will send word of your payment when the deed is done."

Someone was going to die but it would not be me. I nodded to him and took my leave, ignoring Krellik's speculative look as I left.

Astrid was also surprised by my return. I wasn't sure what Donovan would do or how it would happen but my answer came soon enough when the stolen boys appeared outside the Nursery Hatch. Their faces were ashen and haunted. Clearly Donovan took my request to heart and decided to exterminate the entire gang. It wasn't a great loss, one less gang competing in the games. The surprise was the women. Nearly ten, all clearly heavy with child, timid little things, half blind in the corridor lights. The oldest bore a hand written note from the man himself.

'I have taken care of your pest problem. I have returned your charges and turned over the women we found in the Underbelly to your care. This is your payment. If the children are our future, ensure they survive to see it.'

I took a breath, unsure what I had expected he demand of me. It wasn't a stop to the games, of even a true assurance of continued safety, but ten young mothers who I could ensure would deliver their babies alive. It was the largest cluster of young we had seen in years.

It might be enough to keep the Hive adrift a few years more.

