“You have wrecked many crews on many ships.” The Neb commander paces a circle around him.
Marne glances back at Carnas and Corzin. Then he directs me to one of the flight crew. That’s my target.
I nod. I can take him out. I’m a good enough shot.
“But what I want from you is not your death. It is your life.” The commander stops in front of Azrim. “In the Nebulous Empire, we have a sacrificial tradition. The strongest of our enemies must be captured and drained of life which, we then drink to acquire their powers, their strength.”
Cold dread floods my chest.
Marne’s eyes take on a chilling blue hue.
When the commander draws a knife from his belt, I stop caring about the plan. All I see is the blade, Azrim’s fading state, andourfuture lost withoutouralpha.
“Tessi,” Marne’s attention is back on me.
My hands shake with anger.Now, I mouth.
He taps his earcom. Carnas and Corzin rise on the other side of the room, firing at their targets. Marne and I do the same. But I don’t stop when my target dies. I run for Azrim, for the knife rising above his head at an angle that aims for his neck. My shots bounce off of the commander’s shield.
He laughs at me as I empty my magazine. Marne, Carnas and Corzin thrash their way through the Nebs that enter from adjoining rooms. I am the only one who can protect Azrim. His guards leave to assist their brethren with Carnas, whose fur plates up. He turns the bodies around him into a scene of carnage the way he bashes into them, breaking bone and spitting flesh.
I don’t know what I’m thinking. I’m not really. Blood rushes in my ears. My heart threatens to burst from the adrenaline suring through me. Fire burns in my tired muscles.
All I know is that Azrim and his family have suffered enough.
I throw myself in front of Azrim, reach up with both hands and stop the commander’s swing. Quivers run through my arms as I fight with everything I have to hold him back.
Azrim’s face rests against neck. He’s exhausted and broken. I can hear it in his voice. “Let me go.”
The commander grins as he presses his other hand down on the blade. I growl as my arms tremble from the effort.
And then I feel Azrim’s connection, his pain, his isolation, his willingness to sacrifice. The clash of purpose and emptiness.
How strongly he feels like shattering.
Azrim doesn’t realize that, by touching me, I become a conduit. While the commander’s arrogance and self-entitlement is expected, the sheer pressure of the cracking sensations that flow outward from Azrim makes me wonder if I’ll be able to hold myself together, or if I’m going to go out with the commander.
Veins light up in my hands, catching the commander’s attention. His smile wanes. My grip does not. My light crawls into him in Azrim’s jagged lines, splitting the commander open in wild crags. Smoke pours through the fissures.
Azrim wraps an arm around my waist and flings me backward. He corrals me beneath him, forming a shield around my body as the Commander bursts, coating everything in dark gray, sizzling meat.
A Myndrous charges at us, growling and spinning a voltspear. The blur of silvery black fur that smashes into him is a relief. Zorin crushes him under his weight, and rips his throat out with his teeth. Then he staggers back and clumsily sits.
“Is that the last one?” Marne calls out.
Zorin shifts to his humanoid form, rests his arms on his head, and slumps back, covered in far more blood than could’ve come from that single Myndrous. He’s out of breath, and I think he had to fight his way here.
As silence fills the room, I hear a familiar growl. A Neb runs through the room, naked, with Radar clawed into his shoulders with his teeth buried in the soldier’s neck. The Neb careens head first into a wall and slumps. Radar tugs on him still until Carnas eases him back.
Azrim pants above me, tries to lift his body off of mine, and can’t. “You’re fucking insane you know that?”
“And you aren’t?” I ask. “Going on a rescue mission alone…”
His eyes drift away from me.
“Don’t do that.” I help him roll off of me and beside his brother. “We came after you because you’re worth it.”
The confused reverence in Azrim’s eyes tells me we’re at least headed in a better direction than the previous downward spiral.
