No need to step closer than necessary.
"Herion Six, why do I understand you now?"
"My systems contain an automatic translation algorithm. Administrator Lily’s language was not in the database, so a preliminary scan was required for calibration."
"What commands can I give you?"
"The full command registry requires ten standard chrono-cycle days to recite. Please refine your query."
Lily groaned, frustration rising now that the adrenaline was ebbing.
"Can you tell me where I am? And can you take me back to where I was taken from?"
"Current location is uncharted star system fifty-six eighty-seven twenty-five B. Second request: negative."
"Why not? What is stopping you?"
"Administrator KHR issued a complete data purge of all navigational coordinates before life signs terminated."
The bone cutter slipped from Lily’s fingers and clattered across the floor.
"You are telling me his final act was making sure I could never go home?"
The ship fell silent.
Then the voice returned, steady as ever.
"A full memory purge occurred. All navigational data and related systems were erased, except for the previous administrator’s codename. It is probable this was done to protect sensitive personal information. However, my factory-programmed psychological and practical support systems are optimized to assist members of Unregistered Species during forced relocation and galactic acclimatization."
She had been kidnapped. She had fought for her life. By some miracle she had taken command of a starship.
And the only solution this monumental piece of interstellar engineering had to offer her was therapy.
Yes.
Lily’s world shattered.
Irrevocably.
Chapter 3
The Best Revenge Is Finding Joy in Your Reality
Lily
“Hello and welcome to the IMPERIUM, the Intelligent Morpho Planetary Entities’ Systemic-Interaction Union of the Multiverse!”
Lily muted it.
“Yeah, okay. Still kidnapped,” she muttered.
“While the circumstances that brought you here may be tragic, we acknowledge your survival skills and your indomitable will to live.
As representatives of the interstellar government of all spacefaring species, we say: may the Cradle bless you, in honor of the beginning of all life that binds us. Just as the Cradle gave rise to life, the IMPERIUM exists to unite and safeguard all star-citizens beneath its authority.
Do not fret. You will be educated in our ways so that you possess the knowledge necessary not merely to survive, but to thrive.
Your first and most important lesson is the observance of IMPERIUM law. Under our watch, no being goes hungry, no individual may be exploited for their reproductive capacity, and no citizen may be subjected to abuse.
