Page 43 of Trove’s Purpose

“Turvista was killed by a single shot to the neck that shattered her spine. When she was already dead, she was beaten about the face and chest, breaking several bones. With her dead, Kirvan went upstairs. Rate was still up there, unaware of what happened. Kirvan then took the time to block the doors and windows, making sure she couldn’t escape. He then set the fire, starting in the back room, before going upstairs.

“Rate was nude, in the middle of changing, when Kirvan came into her room. There were no signs of a struggle. He just shot. Four times. Right into her head. Unlike Turvista, Rate did not die immediately. But she was injured so gravely, she was rendered completely helpless. And just as he had done with his aunt, Kirvan brutally, ruthlessly, beat his mother to death. He used his free fist and his handmade weapon against her face, chest, and abdomen. By the time he was done, she was completely unrecognizable and the fire was burning out of control.

“There’s no question that Kirvan killed his own mother and aunt, but no one knew it at the time. As he came out of their burning home, people didn’t understand what was happening. Some even tried to help him. But in the chaos and confusion of the fire, of neighbors trying to find Rate and Turvista, to rescue them from the fire, Kirvan somehow managed to get away. He wasn’t watched yet. Though he was bloody, no one realized, could even imagine, what he had done. They weren’t keeping a close enough eye on him and, just like that, he was gone.

“Unfortunately, the delay the fire made meant that a proper search wasn’t started for him for a full day when the murder of his aunt and mother was confirmed. By then, it was too late. He had vanished, and in his wake, he left the lives of two distinguished, successful females completely destroyed for no understandable reason.

“The last known, confirmed, sighting of Kirvan the Unclean, stripped of his clan name after he was charged with his crimes, was on Rik-Vane. I’m sure it comes as no surprise to anyone that someone who murdered his only family, his own mother, would end up in a place like Rik-Vane. And with any hope, he met the same fate there that he had inflicted upon his kin. But with no way to know or confirm for sure, all we can say is that Kirvan the Unclean is guilty of slaughtering his mother and aunt and got away with it completely, making this double familicide an unresolved case.”

Chee was so engrossed in the story, she actually jumped when it ended, just like that. But that wasn’t right. There was still more. How did Trove escape his home planet? How did he get to Rik-Vane? He was a child. She couldn’t say she was a great judge of domini ages having never seen one of their children before, but if he were human, she wouldn’t have put him much older than fifteen. Basically, still a kid.

And how did a kid survive in a place like Rik-Vane? What had he done to live there? To eat? To sleep safely? Rik-Vane was an evil, lawless, hopeless place. Chee didn’t know that personally, of course, she only had the reports that Hyde had given her of that hellhole. She needed to know how a kid was able to live there and how that kid grew up and ended up changing his name, joining a delivery crew, and escaping a place that was considered unescapable.

But, of course, the host of this true crime show didn’t have that information. As far as anyone knew, the story of Kirvan ended there, at the death of his mother and aunt, and only a few reports spoke of what might have happened to him afterwards.

“That wasn’t as… cool as I thought it would be.”

Garnet’s voice, filled with regret, made Chee jump, looking around. She had somehow managed to forget that the girls were all sitting around her, watching the same show. And all of them had uncomfortable looks on their faces.

“Yeah,” Goldie agreed. “I don’t think we should have watched that. Not without Trove being here. Or without his permission.”

“Right,” Garnet nodded, frowning.

Oh, Chee realized dimly. They felt bad not because of the two deaths involved in this story, but because it felt like they had infringed on Trove’s privacy.

“Have you not looked up the others like that?” She asked, looking between them.

Haven was shaking her head, but it was Grace who answered-

“No. The guys tell us that we don’t need to know the details of their lives. They say it’s enough that we know the broad strokes. I kind of… I think I kind of agree now. This didn’t feel fun like I thought it would be.”

The others agreed, and that was how their girl’s night ended. Just kind of fizzling out awkwardly with a sour taste in their mouths. For them, because they had invaded Trove’s past without permission and didn’t realize it was wrong until the last minute.

But Chee couldn’t say that’s why she was unhappy. She understood why they felt guilty, but that wasn’t her reaction. She was just… unsatisfied. Unresolved, like the hostess of the show had said. There was so much she still didn’t know. So many questions she still wanted to ask.

Chee was the last to leave the rec room. The others went first, taking the winding halls to their own rooms. Chee very quickly found herself alone. Shuffling slowly down the hall. A bitter taste in her mouth that wasn’t related to shame.

Trove was so completely centered in her mind, the sight of that young boy stepping out of a fire covered in blood burned into her retinas so deeply, that when she looked up and saw the male himself standing there, she wasn’t at all surprised. But it did seem strange, for just a moment, like the past and present were blurring together in his figure. Kirvan and Trove blending for just a moment so that she could swear she saw both of them there.

Trove with his high ponytail, his big belt with the pistol on his hip, the long jacket that turned his skin into a suede-like shade of brown.

Kirvan with thin and dirty hair, stained with soot and blood, draped in a shirt that was way too big for his thin form.

Both of them clawless, she realized.

Kirvan’s hand had been hard to see, especially the one gripping his gun so tightly, but she had already learned to look for his claws. She even did it now, glancing down at his hands and taking in the blunted digits. And she’d done it to the younger version of him too, but she hadn’t thought about it. Not until right now when they blended together in her mind.

Kirvan hadn’t had claws either. Trove had lost his claws before the crime that branded him as Unclean, before he lived on Rik-Vane, and that just struck her hard.

Because why had he lost his claws?

If things were so normal and happy with his family, why had they not been fixed before?

Why were they still like this now?

“Chee,” he spoke her name softly and her gaze snapped back to his gleaming violet eyes.

“I’m sorry,” she blurted.