Aurora Burning: The Aurora Cycle 2 Read online

  Kal inclines his head. “I did tell you I started that fight as a diversion.”

  “Because I used your name,” he says.

  Kal nods, brooding. “Perhaps I should have silenced them permanently… .”

  My finger taps away at my knee again, the movement involuntary. My hand seems to shift of its own accord, and begins tapping the rhythm out against my left forearm instead.

  Ah.

  I realize I am mimicking the rhythm of Admiral Adams’s finger during the broadcast in which he condemned us. I have watched the footage fourteen times now. I have not tried to shake the compulsion to do so. It is my experience that when my mind seizes on something seemingly insignificant, usually it is solving a problem I have not yet identified.

  It is a hallmark of the highly intelligent.

  Tap, tap, tap.

  Tap, tap.

  Tap.

  We condemn, in strongest possible terms, the actions of Aurora Legion Squad 312 at Sagan Station… .

  Aurora lays one gentle hand on Kal’s arm. “Tell us about your sister,” she suggests, oblivious to my internal problem solving.

  Kal swallows, dropping his gaze to Aurora’s fingers. They are stained with her own blood, red alongside his purple, dried and flaking around her nails.

  “Our father was a warrior of the Warbreed Cabal,” he says. “But our mother was a Waywalker. They are the most spiritual of my people. They study the mysteries of the Fold, and the self. My father taught us to kill. But my mother tried to teach us the waste found in death.” He is quiet for a moment, and I see Aurora’s hand squeeze his. “I took her lessons to heart. Saedii did not.”

  I consider the difference between my own parents. My mother was the more practical. My father was warmer. I wonder what he would think of the person I have become. I am very different now from the little girl I used to be.

  It is an uncomfortable question, and one I have not considered in years.

  I push it away.

  Tap.

  Tap, tap, tap.

  Kal continues. “Saedii and I grew up together, but we grew ever apart. After our father died during the battle at Orion, I joined Aurora Academy to help bridge the gap between our two peoples. My sister joined the Starslayer to tear it wider. In these choices, you find all you need to understand us.”

  “You … ,” Scarlett begins. “You … lost your dad at Orion, too?”

  Kal slowly nods. I see the Jones twins exchange a glance—obviously remembering their own father, who perished in that same infamous battle. Scarlett’s gaze softens as she looks at the Syldrathi boy.

  “I’m sorry, Kal,” she murmurs. “You never said …”

  Kal’s normally perfect posture slumps very slightly. Aurora squeezes his hand again. For a moment, our Tank’s eyes are clouded, his expression pained. But despite this revelation—that three of our squad members lost their fathers in the same bitter conflict—Tyler keeps his mind on the task at hand.

  “And now your sister wants what? To kill you?”

  Kal hears the note in our Alpha’s voice and sits up straight once more. “She wishes me to embrace the war in my blood. The fact that I have not joined the Unbroken is a shame to her. And she will not stop pursuing me until she has her way.”

  “We’re pretty good at dodging pursuit, Kal,” Scarlett says. “We’ve had a lot of practice lately.”

  The Syldrathi shakes his head. “The Waywalkers among my people are sensitives. Empaths. And though she was raised Warbreed, Saedii inherited a touch of our mother’s gift. My sister can … sense me. She has been able to do so since we were children. Not from an infinite distance, but certainly while we are stranded in the Emerald City.” He pauses, lifting his chin in the manner I have learned often proceeds one of his pronouncements that owe more to nobility than sense. “I am a danger to all of you. It is better that I leave, and draw away the peril.”

  Aurora begins to protest, but is cut off by Ty, who lifts one hand—even that movement is pained—and speaks.

  “Nobody’s going anywhere,” he says.

  I am only half listening. My mind is humming as loudly as the tubes around us, and as I watch another pair of bodies shoot past, I am recalling Adams’s face in his message. The rhythm and inflection of his words.

  They have violated our trust.

  Tap.

  Tap, tap, tap.

  They have broken our code.

  Tap, tap, tap.

  My cheeks heat with a momentary flush of embarrassment that it has taken me so long to understand. But there is no time for such indulgence. I take out my uniglass and begin my calculations.

  “Can you sense your sister too, Kal?” Aurora asks. “Because when I’m … when I use my powers … I can see something in you. Feel something in your mind. Maybe you have a touch of your mother in you too?”

  “It is possible, be’shmai,” he replies. “The gift is passed through the blood.”

  I scroll through another round of calculations and—filing away with interest the fact that I feel the urge at all—allow myself a small smile of satisfaction.

  “Zila?” Scarlett notes my change in demeanor, glancing at my uniglass. “Do you have something you want to share with the class?”

  “Yes,” I say, eyes still on my calculations.

  “… Well?” Scarlett asks.

  “Admiral Adams has not abandoned us,” I declare. “His broadcast contained a coded message.”

  I turn my eyes to Tyler.

  “And I have just broken it.”

  5

  KAL

  We have not even kissed yet.

  My squad members would say this is a strange thought to be entertaining in the middle of a crisis. I know Aurora herself would probably think it foolish. And that, in essence, is the heart of the problem. Because I am not feeling what humans feel. I am not feeling like, or lust, or even love.

  I am feeling the Pull.

  Syldrathi poets have spent millennia trying to describe it. I studied the work of our most renowned maesters back on Syldra. Sometimes I put their verses to music and played them on my siif beneath the lias trees outside our home. Billions of words over thousands of years. Songs and sonnets, couplets and hymns. All trying to evoke even a fraction of how this feels.

  Having lived it now, I know not a single one of them has come close.

  The Pull is more than words.

  Love is a drop in the ocean of what I feel for her.

  Love is a single sun in a heaven full of stars.

  And I know Aurora cannot really understand it. That humans do not feel as Syldrathi feel. And as much as I want her, I do not wish to rush her or—spirits forbid—frighten her away. And so I keep all this inside as best I can.

  But we have not even kissed yet.

  Spirits of the Void, this is torture… .

  “Get over yourself, Pixieboy,” Finian mutters.

  “… What?”

  The Betraskan blinks his large black eyes.

  “I said get over here, Pixieboy,” he repeats. “We gotta run through this.”

  I breathe deep, run my hand across my brow. My squad has gathered in the cramped living space of our so-called apartment. This place is smaller than an Enlei’s den, and smells twice as noxious. But we have little choice with our available funds, and with my sister now on the hunt through the Emerald City, we must lay low, among the dregs who ask no questions. At least with Zila’s powers of deduction—nothing short of brilliant, I must admit—we now have a chance of getting off this accursed station once and for all.

  The wall display in our new hovel is nonfunctional, and Finian has his uniglass plugged into his exosuit, projecting a schematic of the Dominion Repository on the opposite wall in glowing light. I take a seat on the tiny couch beside Aurora, staring at the image. Her split brow is knitted closed by a small, flesh-colored suture; the bruise under her right eye is a dark constellation. Her lips are soft, bow-shaped, hypnotic to watch. She reaches out and touches my hand
gently, her fingertips lighting fires across my skin.

  “You okay?” she asks softly.

  I give her my best attempt at a reassuring smile. “I am well.”

  “Will you two get a room?” Tyler says.

  “… What?” I scowl.

  “I said there’s two ways into the room,” Tyler says, pointing to the schematic. “Main entrance to the south, and a smaller one on the west. Both are guarded, but the west has two fewer security goons. So, if trouble hits, that’s the way we leave.”

  “But trouble won’t hit, right?” Scarlett says. “Because all your ideas are amazing?”

  “Exactly,” Tyler says, ignoring his sister’s jab. “Now, according to the admiral’s coded message …”

  Here Tyler pauses to offer Zila a small round of applause, which I and the rest of the squad join in on. Zila ducks her head, dark curls tumbling over her eyes. But I catch the ghost of a smile on her lips as Tyler continues.

  “… there’s some kind of cache waiting for us in the security deposit room, past the main foyer. It’s apparently coded to accept Scar’s DNA ident. Not sure why Adams thought to set it up that way.”

  Scarlett raises one brow. “Because I’m fabulous?”

  “Yeah, that’s definitely it,” Tyler mutters, rolling his eyes. “Anyway, that means Scar will be taking point on this one. We have no idea what’s back there in terms of weight, so Kal, you’re going with her in case it’s heavy.”

  Scarlett glances at me. “You and me, Muscles. Dress sexy.”

  She winks at Aurora, and Aurora smirks back, squeezing my hand. Most of us have become accustomed to Scarlett’s insistence on flirting with anything with a heartbeat. But I notice Finian is staring at the floor, looking altogether glum.

  “Fin, you wanna take them through the run?” Tyler asks.

  Our Gearhead blinks in confusion. “Um … yeah, if you want?”

  “Sorry.” Our Alpha hobbles toward a chair. “I just gotta sit for a minute.”

  Scarlett watches her brother lower himself onto the moldy cushion beside her, one hand at his crotch. She winces in sympathetic agony.

  “Poor baby,” she coos. “Madam Badass really did a number on the boys, huh?”

  “I mean, I can always adopt,” he whimpers.

  “If it makes you feel better, the black eye kinda suits you? The bloodshottiness really brings out the blue.”

  Tyler shoots Scarlett a withering glance, and she grins and ruffles his mop of blond hair. He groans a protest and smooths his locks back into place, only to have them mussed again by his sister’s hand.

  They are so different—he the epitome of order, she the personification of chaos—that I sometimes find it hard to think of them as siblings. But looking at the pair of them, I can see how dearly the Jones twins love each other. They are united in the grief they feel at Zero’s death. The uncertainty in which we find ourselves. Bonded in blood. A true family. Inseparable and unconquerable.

  My own sister and I make a shameful comparison.

  “I’ve got two black belts,” Tyler sighs. “Ten years training in Systema and Krav Maga. And she bounced me like a jetball.”

  “Feel no shame,” I tell him. “Saedii is a master of the Aen Suun.”

  Scarlett frowns as she translates. “The … Wave Way?”

  I nod. “The deadliest of the Warbreed martial arts. Before he died, my father trained us personally. Since we were children.” Sorrow fills my heart at the memory of the three of us training beneath the lias trees. I give Tyler a sad smile. “Saedii has kicked me below the belt on more than one occasion. So you have my sympathies.”

  “More than once?” Tyler winces and shifts again. “Maker’s breath, how are you still alive?”

  “I did warn you not to let her get close.”

  “It wasn’t by choice, believe me,” he groans. “If I have anything to say about it, the young lady in question will be kept at minimum safe distance from now on. A couple of star systems away oughta do it.”

  “That may not be up to us. Saedii and her adepts will still be hunting me. One does not become a Templar of the Starslayer by giving up on her prey easily.”

  “All the more reason to get in and out of the Repository quickly,” Aurora says.

  “Nice segue, Stowaway,” Finian smiles, turning to his schematic and drawing a deep breath. “Okay, so the plan is simple. Get in, access whatever Adams left for us in the deposit box, then get out. Our big problem is, of course, the bounty we have on our heads for galactic terrorism.”

  “Alleged terrorism,” Zila points out.

  “Right. Alleged. So, good news is, Emerald City has a population of over a million people, so it’s not like we’ll be easy to spot. Bad news is, the Dominion Repository has a security system that feeds into the webnodes of most major galactic governments, and their cams are equipped with top-tier facial recognition software. I’m talking the kind that can recognize you by your eyebrows.”

  Scarlett tosses her flame-red bob. “Well, they are amazing.”

  “Um, yeah.” Finian taps a ream of scrolling data beside the schematic. “So what I’m saying is, a jetball cap and sunglasses isn’t going to cut it in there. Those systems are gonna ping us as wanted criminals real quick.”

  “We could use the GIA uniforms again?” Aurora offers.

  Tyler shakes his head. “Too risky after what went down at the docks. The GIA is so rare this far from the Core, those uniforms will just attract attention now.”

  “I presume you have a solution?” I ask.

  “Matter of fact, we do, Pixieboy,” Finian smiles. “The Repository cams will clock us once we walk in. No helping that. But there’ll be a delay while their systems transmit to their affiliates. The speed of light only travels so fast, even through the Fold. By the time the data is on its way back, I can be running a flakscreen on the uplink. Block the incoming signal long enough for us to be in and out.”

  “Impressive,” I say.

  Scarlett smiles. “Impressive is Fin’s middle name.”

  A suspicious stain very close to a blush spreads across Finian’s cheeks at Scarlett’s flattery, but Tyler intercedes.

  “Nnnnnnot so much,” he says.

  “Wow, thanks, Goldenboy,” Finian mutters. “Way to boost morale.”

  “Sorry.” Our Alpha shifts himself on the couch again. “It’s the crown jewels; they’re killing me. But you know what I mean, Fin—tell them the tricky part.”

  Finian concedes his not-so-impressive status with a grudging nod. “Tricky part is, I’ve gotta be inside the Repository while I run the hack.”

  A small frown creases Zila’s brow. “I think it highly unlikely that Dominion security will allow you to simply sit in their foyer engaging in computer espionage.”

  “Right,” Tyler says. “That’s where you and me come in, Zil.”

  The girl blinks. “You and … me?”

  “Yeah,” he smiles, his signature dimple creasing his cheek. “So listen, you wanna go on a date with me?”

  · · · · ·

  I do not know how Scarlett keeps acquiring these clothes.

  Her ability to summon new outfits seemingly at will is almost supernatural. She was gone for a total of eighty-seven minutes with only a handful of credits in her pocket, and she returned with a new wardrobe for each of us, suited to the mission at hand. She does not steal—she waved receipts in Zila’s and Aurora’s faces and regaled them with tales of retail prowess, using arcane words like twofer and cleav discount. Aurora expressed an inordinate amount of joy over the shoes Scarlett found for her. I was concerned her squeals might attract neighborhood security.

  I make a mental note of that.

  She likes shoes.

  Scarlett tossed a shopping bag at my chest, and I peered suspiciously at the contents, one eyebrow rising to my hairline.

  “Really?”

  The oldest Jones twin only smiled. “Trust me.”

  Now the mission awaits, and so we retir
e to various rooms in our dingy flat to change. Aurora, Scarlett, and Zila take to the bedroom; Finian heads off to the bathroom for some privacy. I note that his exosuit hisses as he walks, that he is favoring his left leg heavily. I suspect he requires assistance to change his clothes but is declining it in an attempt to assert independence. I do not know enough about his condition to be worried, but I worry all the same.

  With nowhere left to use, Tyler and I get changed together in the tiny living area. It is the first time we have been alone since a certain kiss in a certain computer maintenance room on the World Ship. I haul off my maintenance uniform and struggle into the pants Scarlett gave me. Tyler slips off his coveralls, drags his undershirt off, stripping down to his shorts and the silver chain he wears around his neck, his father’s ring looped through the links. As he reaches for the pants his sister bought him, I find myself studying him from the corner of my eye.

  Our Alpha looks weary. Shoulders slumped. Bruises from my sister’s beating laid in stripes across the muscles of his back, the lines of his torso. He pulls a tunic over the damage, drags his hand through his shaggy blond hair, and sighs.

  I can feel his mind at work. The uncertainty he keeps hidden behind a wall of optimism. His uniglass quietly beeps upon the table—a reminder from its internal calendar. I see the words MY BIRTHDAYYYY—2 DAYS! light up the screen.

  “I did not know it was your and Scarlett’s birthday soon,” I say.

  Sorrow fills Tyler’s eyes, turning bright blue to steel gray.

  “It’s not,” he says quietly, motioning to the uniglass. “I threw my uni at the ultrasaur on the World Ship. That one belonged to …”

  I realize who he means without him having to say her name. He must have taken the device from her on Octavia III. I can see the pain in Tyler’s eyes as he looks at that message—one more reminder of all she will never have, will never be.

  “I grieve for Zero,” I tell him softly. “I know what she meant to you.”

  He looks up at that. I see her face reflected in his eyes—the ink on her skin, the fire in her stare. Then he looks at the ceiling, blinking rapidly.

  “Yeah.”

  “You are doing the right thing, Tyler Jones.”