Page 112 of Stripped By the Alien

"Four planets," she goes on, undeterred. "And to think that none of it happens without the alien female and her strange little drone! Looking back, it was lucky that you found her in that minefield. Perhaps some things are meant to happen." She pats my arm with one claw. "Imagine it, Chief Harrower. You, standing beside a new Queen, the whole Brood remembering your name for a thousand longcycles. Every egg hatched in the Nest for a generation will hear your name before they hear their own. And many of them will be your offspring! You will mate with the new Queen! Many, many times!"

I say nothing.

She takes my silence for modesty and presses on, painting the future in broader and broader strokes. Banquets, monuments, the young Queen at my side, a mate to warm my bed and share such glorious duty.

Every word hits me like a stone dropped into a well that has no bottom I can find.

Sris has no idea. She thinks she's cheering me up.

Across the chamber, Brax'tok stands very still, watching the stars fall away behind us. He has been quiet since we left orbit, quieter than I've ever seen him. Something in his stillness worries me more than his usual needling ever did. He notices me watching and drifts closer, waving Sris off with a small, courteous gesture she doesn't seem to mind.

"A fine catch, Chief Harrower," he finally says. "The Queen will be very pleased. I imagine you'll be summoned immediately on our arrival."

I look away. "Probably."

"You should prepare yourself." He folds his hands behind his back, the same easy stance he held in the vacuum, on the Beast's hide, when he first said the word Marankz to me. "Once you're confirmed as First Royal Mate, there will be very little time for anything but the Nest. The new Queen will need you close for many longcycles. Guards at every door, of course. For her protection, and for yours." He says it lightly, almost kindly. "No more solitary patrols. No more idle stops in some quiet system to watch the stars to relieve the boredom. I don't imagine you'll even keep the Beast. A Royal Mate has no need to fly his own ship when he never leaves the Nest."

Something in my chest goes very cold. "She would be released into space, I suppose," I say, and I'm surprised by how steady my voice comes out.

"Oh no. Very likely she will be wanted by the breeders. It would be wasteful to let such a fine vessel simply leave our service." He says it as though it's a small thing, a footnote, and perhaps to him it is. "But think what you'd gain instead! Power beyond what any Chief Harrower has held in generations. A name in the songs of our Brood. I only mean to help you see it clearly, Krix'vorr, so there are no surprises for you, once it's yours."

I try to picture the Queen, but I can only see Nora's face.

"Of course," I rasp. "I'm grateful for the clarity. But I'm not Royal Mate yet. There are other strong candidates, I'm sure."

He inclines his head and drifts away again, back toward the quiet corner he's claimed for himself. I'm left standing at the 'eye', watching the stars pass, thinking of open silence and a small, empty cabin, and finding that I can no longer tell which future frightens me more.

34

- Nora -

The calf's beak punches through the station's outer hull with a sound like a gunshot muffled in wet paper, and then we're through.

The calf holds himself trembling and still in the ragged wound he's made, his small body wedged into the gap like a tick that's bitten down and doesn't plan to let go.

"Structural integrity fields are already sealing around the breach," Lucius reports, one of his sensors angled back at the hole we've made. "Which is good. It means their systems think this is routine damage, not intrusion. Bad news: it also means we probably have a time limit before local maintenance drones investigate. Could be seconds, could be hours. I don't know yet."

"Then let's not still be here when they arrive." I unfold myself from the little chamber, joints protesting, and drop down into the space beyond the breach.

It's dark, and it smells wrong. The Beast is all warm and living and organic, but this is something colder. There's metal and ozone and, underneath that, something sweetish that I don't let myself think too hard about, but makes me think of hospitals.

The boots that I painstakingly made from rolls of the tough tape on the Beast hit a floor of ridged alloy plate, not warm, softish flesh.

"I think this is a service conduit," Lucius says, already turning in a slow circle, lights flickering across his casing as he scans. "I see cables and waste recycling. That looks like atmospheric processing. We're behind the walls the way we were never able to be, aboard the Beast." I can hear something almost like delight in his voice. "Do you understand what this means, Captain? Doors. Locks. Cameras. All of it built by hands, or the equivalent, not grown. I can talk to this."

"Talk fast," I whisper. "Which way?"

He extends his small manipulator arm and touches it to an access panel set low in the wall. For a few seconds nothing happens except a faint, high whine that makes my teeth ache.

"I'm in," he says. "These guys are in the Stone Age when it comes to cybersecurity. That will make our mission much easier. Reading station schematics now. This will take a moment, Captain. The architecture is unfamiliar, but the logic underneath it is not so different from ours. Machines think alike, wherever they're built. But I have to learn their language, and that sometimes takes a while. Stand by."

I wait, heart beating fast. I have to give him time. Everything he says makes sense - Earth is remarkably far ahead when it comes to computer-everything, compared to what the various refugees from the Space Locusts have shown us. So if the Gzet computers are easy to break into, then that is just a part of our plan. This whole rescue is a long shot with a breathtakingly low chance of working. But I have Lucius. I have my Space Force training. And I have…

Damn. My face scrunches up just thinking of him.

I take several deep breaths and get myself under control.

All right. I have the training I did with Krix'vorr, and some other things he showed me without even knowing about.