Although Scarlet's thoughts were as thick as mud, her fingers were nimble
and fast, dancing through the familiar motions of powering down
the godship. Just like all those nights she returned to the farm after
finishing her deliveries. She could almost smell the musty tang of her
grandmother's hangar, combined with the fresh, earthy breeze coming
off the fields. She lowered the landing gear and eased down the brakes.
The ship settled, humming idly for a moment before she shut down the
engine, and it fell silent.
Something thumped behind her. A woman began to yell shril-ly, her
anger made sticky and confusing in Scarlet's cobwebbed brain.
A headache began to throb in the front of her skull, gradually taking
over entire head. Scarlet flinched and leaned back in the pilot's seat,
pressing her palms over her eye to shout out the pain, the swamp of
confusion, the sudden piercing light that burst through her vision.
She groaned, slumping forward. No harness caught her like she'd expected
and soon she was hunched over her knees, taking full gasping breaths as if she'd
nearly drowned.
Her mouth was dry, her jaw aching as if she'd been riding her teeth
for hours. But as she held very still, and choked on very deep breaths,
the throbbing in her head began to subside. Her thoughts cleared. The
muffled yelling sharpened and spiked.
Scarlet opened her eyes. A surge of nausea passed over her, but she
swallowed hard and let it pass.
She knew instantly that not her delivery ship, and she was
not in her grandmother's hangar. The smell was all wrong, the floorboards
too clean....
"... want Lieutenant Hensla sent down immediately, along with a full
team for scouting and ship identification..."
The woman's voice shot like electricity through Scarlet's nerves, and
she remembered. The ship, the attack, the gun in her hand, the bullet
hitting Wolf in the chest, the sense of hollowness as the thaumaturge
burrowed into her brain, took over her thoughts, took away all sense of
identity and will.
"... use the shuttle's history to track the last location, and see if it
has any lingering connectivity to the main ship. They may have gone to
Earth. Figure it out. Find her."
Scarlet raised her head enough that she could peer out of the podship's
side window. Luna She was on Luna, docked in an enclosed space that
was nothing at all like the hangars she had known or the podship dock
of the Rampion. It was large enough to house a dozen shuttle, and a
few were already lined up alongside hers, their sleek shapes ornamented
with the royal Lunar insignia. The walls were jagged and black, but
speckled with small glowing lights, to mimic a nonexistent sky. A faint
was glowing up from the ground, so that the shadows of the podships
stretched like birds of prey along the cavernous walls.
At the end of the row of ships was an enormous arched doorway,
embedded with glittering stones that depicted a crescent moon rising
above planet earth.
"... took this D-COMM from the programmer who betrayed us. See if
the software techs can use it to trace the companion chip ..."
The podship door behind her was still open, and the thaumaturge
was standing just outside the ship, yelling at the people who had gathered
around her—two guards in red and gray uniforms and a middle-aged
man who wore a simple belted robe and was hastily plugging information
into a portscreen. The thaumature's long white coat was smeared
with blood, and soaked through where it draped over her thigh. She
stood slightly hunched, her hands pressed over the wound.
The arched door began to open, cutting a slit through the center
of the glittering earth as the doors peeled back. Scarlet ducked back down. She
heard the subtle click and hum of magnets, the clatter of footsteps.
"Finally," the thaumaturge seethed. "The uniform is ruined—cut
away the material and and be quick. The bullet didn't pass through, and the
wound hasn't—" She cut off with a kiss.
Daring to glance up, Scarlet saw that three new people had arrived,
dressed in white lab coats. They brought a hovering gurney with them,
stocked with a full lab's worth of medical supplies, and were all crowded
around the thaumaturge, one unbuttoning her coat while another tried
to cut a square of fabric away from her pants, though the material
seemed to have cemented itself to the wound.
The thaumaturge recovered and rearranged her features to disguise
how much pain she was in, though her olive skin had taken on a yellowish
pallor. One of the doctors managed to peel the material away from the wound.
"Have Sierra send for a new uniform, and contact Thaumaturge Park
to inform him that there will soon be changes to our procedures for
gathering intelligence in relation to the Earthen leaders."
"Yes, Thaumaturge Miura," said the middle-aged man. "Speaking of
Park, you should know that he already had a meeting with Emperor
Kaito regarding our fleet of operatives that appears to no longer be in
disguise."
She cursed. "I forgot about the ships. I hope he was smart enough not
to tell then anything before we've established an official statement." She
paused to take in a warbling breathe. "Also, inform Her majesty of my
return."
Scarlet slid down in the seat her eyes darted to the door on the other
side of the podship. She considered starting the engine, but she had
no chance of escaping in the Rampion's shuttle. They had to be under-
ground, and the port's exit probably required special authorization to
open.
YOU ARE READING
Cress
Teen FictionTheir best hope lies with Cress, a girl trapped on a satellite since childhood who's only ever had her netscreens as company. All that screen time has made Cress an excellent hacker. Unfortunately, she's being force to work for Queen Levana, and she...
