Page 40 of Music of the Ocean

“It depends on who’s in charge of it, honestly.”

The city’s pulse shifted. In the bioluminescent shimmer of the chamber, a sharp thrum spiked through the water.

Indigo glanced at the wall and gestured. The surface rippled, displaying a new probe hitting the water.

It started broadcasting immediately. “This is Captain Mollen of the Federation vessel SC Heathglow. You have thirty minutes to return Lieutenant Delmar to the coordinates attached. We will interpret your failure to comply as an act of aggression. Stand by for retrieval.”

“That’s aimed at you. So much for negotiation, I guess.” Saxby sighed deeply as he stared at Indigo.

“I expected no less,” Indigo said as a series of deep, resonant pulses shuddered through the city.

The lights along the corridors surged, then flickered as a cascade of secondary alarms erupted. Indigo moved to the wall and triggered a new display. The coral shimmered, then projected a view of the ocean above, rendered in flickering bands of ultraviolet and blue.

In the projection, something massive drifted in orbit.

“Holy shit, you can see into space?”

“Of course. How else can the planet protect itself if it cannot see everything above and below the water?”

The starship was depicted as a bright, angular shadow. A few smaller vessels jettisoned from its hull. Indigo tapped a sequence, and the view zoomed in. The shuttles had torpedoes attached and were heavily shielded.

“Oh gods, they’re not even waiting to see if you release me. And photon torpedoes on shuttles? They actually armed the shuttles with those? The hell are they doing?” Saxby whispered, horrified. “Gods, Indigo, they’re going to attack, and I’m not worth that kind of destruction! No single person is.”

Indigo spun to face Saxby, a snarl on his lips. “You are wrong. Every person who is claimed is worth the fight the planet will put up, but you? You are so much more to me and to the planet. You are mine!”

“But one person can’t outweigh the needs of so many—”

“Listen to me,” Indigo hissed, his voice rising above the low drone of the city’s alarms. “You speak as if you are an object to be traded to avoid an attack. But you are more than that. Every living being that the ocean claimed is precious. Every one of you matters. But you—” Indigo’s pupils flared wide, the bands of light along his arms pulsing almost white hot. “I have never felt this.”

“Indigo—”

Indigo pressed a palm to his chest. “You are the reason I have not already let the planet drag down that starship, thus destroying it.”

“Holy shit, it can actually do—”

“You are my new reason to get up in the morning and to look forward to my evenings.” Indigo’s voice broke. “You give me the will to do what the planet asks of me. You are not a casualty or a bargaining chip. You are my music of the ocean.”

Saxby stared at Indigo, mouth opening and closing. He pulled away from the wall and stalked across the chamber before rounding on Indigo, hands slapping at his own chest. “How can you even say that? You barely know me. How could you look at me and—”

The words were unable to bridge the gap between their bodies, their planets, their histories.

Saxby squeezed his eyes shut, taking a ragged breath. “You’re ancient. You’ve had centuries. Lives. Lovers.” He gestured at the alien, at the bioluminescent bands that marked every line of Indigo’s body. “You’re the legend little kids dream up when they stare at the ocean.”

Indigo watched Saxby, waiting.

“I’m—” Saxby bit down on the word. “I’m just a grunt in a fleet uniform. My entire life before this was keeping my head down and avoiding attention.”

Indigo took a single step forward. “You underestimate yourself.”

“I don’t. I really, really don’t.” Saxby paced, his voice rising with each circuit of the chamber. “Every time I walk into a room, I am the least interesting person there.”

“Again, you underestimate yourself.”

“Do I, though? I know you think I’m useful to the planet or to you. Or maybe I’m some sort of exception to a statistical curve, but this—” Saxby waved a hand at the projection of the ocean, the fortress, the alarms. “This is so far out of my league, I can’t even see the ballpark from here.”

Indigo tilted his head, watching, unblinking. “You assume I have not met many humans. I have over the centuries. None of them were like you.”

Saxby thumped his chest with his fist. “What is it about me, then? What’s so special about me that you’d risk open war and showing what this planet is capable of?”