The group moved down the ramp, strung out in a line. Mari led the way, followed closely by Phlip, then Jerro, then Greg, who walked beside him. Behind them, by several tails, trailed the human and Squiggy. She had perched on the human’s shoulder, and the furless creature carried her with steady patience that made the arrangement feel strangely natural—like they had done it before.

  As they moved, energy bursts rippled down the tube walkway toward their ship and returned toward the towers in waves. It reminded Mari of their approach to the complex, that same pulse and reply, like the whole place was breathing through conduits instead of lungs.

  At the end of the walkway, they reached a nexus with openings to a dozen other tubes. Most were retracted and sealed, dark mouths closed tight, but the one next to theirs dilated and produced the Inquisitor and two guardians. Above them, the center of the ceiling expanded, spreading outward. A platform descended and stopped flush with their floor. Another six guardians stood motionless along the perimeter, garbed in the same powered armor and bearing the Borruki crest on their left breastplate, but lacking cloaks.

  “The Queen Regent would like to meet you all,” the Inquisitor said plainly, gesturing toward the platform as if he were inviting them to dinner.

  Mari glanced back at her friends, then at the Inquisitor. “Uhhh, I’m not sure about that. What if we just get our ship repaired and be on our way? We really don’t want to be a bother or anything.”

  “I insist. It is no bother,” the Inquisitor replied, reinforcing the gesture by raising his brow line with a practiced calm that made Mari’s stomach tighten.

  The friends looked at each other, sharing unease through the mindspace. They all felt the same conclusion settle, heavy and unpleasant. They did not have a choice. This wasn’t a request.

  Together, they stepped onto the platform. The guardians shifted with them, surrounding the group in a loose ring that could tighten in a second. The Inquisitor and his two guardians joined as well.

  The ceiling opened again. The platform accelerated rapidly upward into the tower’s interior. Floor after floor flashed by too quickly to make out details. Mari tried anyway, watching for patterns, exits, anything she could anchor to, but the tower swallowed the view as soon as it offered it.

  When the platform stopped, it did so abruptly yet smooth, the kind of motion that reminded Mari of a well-tuned machine. They stood in a large circular room. The outer walls were lined with windows that gave a full view of the planet below. They were high enough that the curvature was unmistakable—the landscape bending away into haze.

  Several large columns encircled the interior. Ornate banners hung around them. Toward the bottom, where the fabric tapered to a point, the emblem of the Borruki rested. Heroic imagery shifted to life across the body of the cloth. Borruki struck confident poses against backgrounds that alternated between ceremony and war, between clean light and ruined ground.

  Directly ahead, a wide set of steps led up to a sleek metal throne. The architecture was cohesive in a way that felt almost oppressive, as if every angle and surface had been designed to remind visitors that this place did not tolerate improvisation. Even the guardians’ armor matched the room, from the plating to the seams.

  Atop the throne sat a tall Borruki with softer features than Lukyaza or the others they had met. A diadem rested on her head, the central gem swirling with shifting hues that moved from cool shades into warmer ones and back again. A fitted emerald robe draped her body and overflowed onto the throne like pooled fabric.

  Mari held the stare. Held the moment. The regal figure’s irises were a soft violet that seemed to glow at the edges—not bright, but present, like a warning you only noticed after it had already affected you.

  Two guardians in ornately engraved armor and flowing cloaks flanked the throne at floor level, rigid and silent.

  The Inquisitor moved through the group with a grace that felt rehearsed and approached the throne. He took a knee and addressed her with deep respect, speaking in the Borruki language.

  The Queen placed a translation disc on her temple and dialed it. “Please, let us speak so that our guests may understand as well. Did you encounter any faction resistance?”

  The Inquisitor turned his torso slightly, still holding eye contact with her. He gestured toward the group, presenting them as evidence. “As you wish, my Queen. Surface tension has escalated. We intercepted two Grishki skiffs patrolling the equatorial region. Regrettably, I have been unsuccessful in locating Prince Lukyaza. However, I do return with a recent development.”

  “Approach and tell me more,” the Queen said, breaking her gaze with the Inquisitor and looking back toward the group.

  “Come forward and present yourselves,” Tuyaza ordered.

  They did so. Guardians flanked their movement, not touching, but close enough that Mari could feel the space being managed around them.

  “Kneel before the Queen,” the Inquisitor commanded.

  “That is unnecessary,” the Queen said immediately, dismissing his command with a subtle wave of her paw. Tuyaza’s expression flickered. It was small, but Mari caught it. Surprise, then control.

  The Queen studied them as they stood there, surrounded by armor and glass and the curvature of a world beneath their feet.

  “When you met my son, what did he tell you?” she asked bluntly.

  Mari felt Jerro and Greg hold still beside her. Their faces went neutral in the same way. Their bodies did not. Mari’s heart was pounding in her chest.

  How did she know? Mari sent. Is she in here with us?

  The Queen’s lips formed a sharp grin. My dear children. If you resist, this will be rather unpleasant for yourselves and your friends.

  Her voice did not travel through the air. It entered their minds with cold precision and stabbing pain.

  The pain rippled through Mari’s thoughts, echoing through her body like a second heartbeat made of needles. She looked over her shoulder and saw the same expression on Greg and Jerro. They were feeling it too, the shared reality of it. Squiggy pressed herself tighter against the human’s shoulder, her limbs trembling, and the human lifted a hand slowly, not in defense, but in instinct, resting its furless palm against Squiggy’s back as if the touch itself could ground her.

  “Enough of this!” Mari shouted, rage rising in her throat. Blue-white fire flared behind her eyes, and the circumscribed diamond emblem on her forehead matched their intensity.

  “NO.”

  The Queen’s voice boomed through the chamber. The air compressed and distorted. A force wave rippled outward, throwing the group back as time dilated and slowed, then snapped back into place as if reality had been yanked tight.

  Mari was first up, with Greg and Jerro right behind her. She tried to channel a mind blast directly at the Queen.

  Nothing came.

  The Queen held up a small metallic sphere. A red ring glowed around its circumference, and it produced a low hum that was barely audible, but the effect was immediate. The sound did not stop their thoughts. It drowned them. Mari felt her mind pushing against it like lungs fighting water, every attempt to reach the mindspace turning into a suffocating strain.

  “I thought you might try something like that,” the Queen said calmly. “Now, if you will, I have questions to which I would like answers.”

  The guardians had returned to their feet. Several drew short blades and tightened their perimeter. If it was not clear before, it was now. This was not a meeting. It was containment.

  “Shackle their minds,” the Queen directed, her tone precise.

  Tuyaza gestured with an open paw. Four guardians produced metallic collars and opened them with a quick flick of the wrist.

  Greg shoved the guardian who approached him. Two more stepped in immediately, grappling Greg’s arms and slamming him onto the cold metal floor. A third pressed the collar around his neck. It scaled automatically, and the red ring activated with a pulse that made Greg’s body jerk once.

  Mari, Jerro, and Squiggy did not resist. Mari watched Squiggy’s eyes dart, terrified, but the little hyrax held still, pressed close to the human until a guardian guided her away and placed the collar around her neck with the same detached efficiency used for fitting a part to equipment.

  Noticeably, they did not collar the human. They did not even attempt it. The guardians treated the furless creature as a secured item already accounted for.

  Mari tried again to reach into the mindspace.

  A wall had been built there. Impenetrable and infinite.

  The Queen deactivated the sphere and placed it on a small table adjacent to the throne. “Now,” she said, returning to her previous tone with sharper emphasis, “what did my son tell you when you met him in the jungle?”

  Mari stared into the Queen’s eyes. She blinked quickly, looked away, then forced herself back into that violet gaze.

  “He told us he was looking for a relic,” Mari said, the words catching before they came free. “An artifact.”

  “Good,” the Queen replied. “That was not so hard, was it?” She tilted her head. “Did he mention its purpose?”

  “No,” Mari responded quickly. “He just said it was created and hidden by the original Borruki millions of years ago when they settled here.”

  The frustration she had been holding broke through anyway, spilling out sharp and hot. “What is it even? He didn’t find anything. We ran into these hyrax—they were the reason for his death. We were trying to help. We brought him back from that place. The Glorp.”

  The Queen’s gaze narrowed into a squint that felt more like focus than emotion.

  “So,” she said after a long pause, “Lukyaza is dead then.”

  “Well, that does change things,” she added, her eyes shifting toward Tuyaza.

  Mari noticed what the Queen did not ask. Nothing about The Glorp. Nothing about the hyrax. Mari felt it press against her ribs like a hard object. Did she already know? She thought. Or did she not care?

  “Mari,” the Queen said, returning her attention with a clinical steadiness, “you and your friends were an unexpected variable. It seems you have proven useful despite your ignorance. Under different circumstances, you may have even proven yourselves worthy allies in the coming conflicts.” She paused only long enough for the words to land. “Inquisitor, take the human up for extraction. Dematerialize the rest of them.”

  Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

  “What?” Mari’s voice broke on the word. “You said we helped wh–”

  The Queen lifted an empty paw and closed it into a tight fist.

  Mari’s chest heaved, seized from the inside. Her voice was dragged back down into her throat. She could not speak. She could only choke on the shape of her own protest.

  “Do not worry,” Tuyaza whispered with a quiet smile as he shoved Mari back toward the platform. “You will be with the heretic prince again shortly.”

  From behind the throne, a cloaked figure hobbled out.

  A wooden cane, twisted and warped, clacked against the metallic floor. The rhythm was uneven—the sound of old damage carried into present motion. A large flat tail protruded from the cloak.

  Jerro’s body went rigid.

  A guardian struck him from behind, the blow snapping his head forward. Jerro stumbled, vision flaring white, then dark.

  The cloaked figure leaned toward the Queen, whispering. Mari couldn’t hear the words over the pulse in her own ears.

  Jerro forced his eyes open. Through the blur, he looked up at the throne.

  The figure turned its head toward them.

  Worn silver fur. A scar that split across a patched eye. The shape of the face, the posture, the weight of authority held without effort.

  Jerro’s mouth opened, but no sound came. His throat tightened as recognition hit with a force that had nothing to do with the guardian’s strike.

  Ordinate Rull? This thought was drowned out by the collar. It would only be known to Jerro.

  Another strike from behind sent his vision back into darkness.

  Mari watched as two guardians flanked the human and guided it onto the platform. The human did not struggle. It simply turned its head once, slowly, looking back toward Squiggy. She strained against the guardians separating her, making a small, broken sound that did not become a word. The human lifted its hand as far as the guardians allowed and held it there, palm open, as if promising it would return even if it did not understand what promise it was making.

  The platform shot upward into the core of the tower. The human vanished as the portal rotated and sealed the path with a smooth, indifferent motion.

  Greg’s gaze locked onto Mari. His dark brown eyes glazed and welled, but the grief did not get to finish forming. His expression shifted as his focus moved past Mari, past her shoulder, looking through her.

  Mari assumed he was looking at Jerro and turned her head to check on him.

  She realized it was not Jerro Greg was watching.

  Their ship was slowly emerging into view beyond the long strip of windows across the chamber, rising from below like a predator surfacing from deep water. It moved with deliberate control. Both fore-and-aft turrets rotated toward the windows and held there, aligning with cold precision.

  Jerro’s vision returned in painful flashes. Warm blood ran through his fur and into his focus. From his prone position, he followed Mari and Greg’s gaze and saw the ship’s silhouette settle into place outside the glass.

  Greg’s voice tore through the room. “GET DOWN!”

  He tackled Squiggy to the floor just as the first barrage hit.

  Energy blasts ripped through the strip of windows, lighting the entire chamber as psionic pulses crackled into columns and stone. Glass shattered outward and inward. Shrapnel rained through the air, chunks of metal and stone spinning and screaming as they fell. Guardians were struck and sent reeling across the floor. Banners tore free and caught fire, revealing the columns they had veiled.

  The barrage was relentless. Pulses ricocheted off the floor and ceiling, turning the throne room into a storm of light and debris with no safe center.

  Mari grabbed Phlip and hauled him behind the far side of a nearby column. Jerro staggered after them, using it as cover while the guardians tried to return fire. Their powered suits drove them forward in heavy, deliberate strides, but turret fire broke their shields and cut them down before they could close the distance.

  Across the room, Greg and Squiggy found refuge behind another column. Squiggy pressed herself into the stone, trembling, and Greg kept his body angled between her and the open space as if his own frame could be a shield.

  The Queen still sat on her throne with the cloaked figure at her side. A force field shimmered around them, absorbing the assault with an eerie steadiness. The light from the impacts played across the Queen’s emerald robe without changing her posture. She did not flinch.

  Tuyaza and the last remaining guardian pressed themselves against a narrow section of windowless wall near the lift, using a concavity in the architecture to create shadowed cover from the ship’s onslaught. Turret fire focused on the Queen and Tuyaza’s positions, suppressing their action.

  “Let’s go!” Mari shouted toward Greg, pushing her voice above the roar.

  Greg patted Squiggy quickly, and they sprinted.

  Mari, Jerro, and Phlip were already moving. They ran at full speed across the open floor toward the windows. Their ship hovered outside, positioned within two tails of the broken frame. It was a long jump, especially now, and the collars made their psionics feel like they were wrapped in wire.

  Mari reached the edge first and stopped just long enough to make sure Jerro and Phlip went ahead. Jerro leapt and caught the ship’s deck with a hard landing. Phlip followed with ease, clearing Jerro’s landing spot and helping him to his feet.

  Greg and Squiggy followed. Greg was faster than any of them, but he stayed behind Squiggy, shepherding her through the chaos so she did not get swallowed by it.

  They were close. A few more tails and they would be on the deck, and then the sky, and then away.

  A strong paw grabbed Greg’s ankle and yanked.

  Greg slammed onto the floor with a thud. Pain flared through his ribs and up his spine, sharp enough to turn his stomach. He tried to inhale and it came in broken pieces. One of the guardians that had been struck down lay on its side, half-conscious, eyes locked on Greg with stubborn survival.

  The guardian pulled Greg back, but Greg reacted instantly. He wrapped his legs around the guardian’s neck and locked in, squeezing like a constrictor. The struggle lasted only moments before the guardian’s grip loosened and its head fell back.

  Greg panted, breath harsh in his chest, and then Mari’s voice cut through the noise, raw with panic. “Greg. Greg! GREG!”

  Greg’s focus snapped back to her. He released the guardian, spun to his feet, and sprinted. He took the leap in stride, landing hard on the deck with a slide.

  Jerro and Greg reached down and hauled Mari aboard.

  Mari did not pause long enough to feel relief. She pointed toward the cockpit. “Go check the turrets and see what’s up. I’m taking Phlip and Squiggy forward to see who’s flying this thing.”

  They split without argument.

  The ship pulled away from the building and gained altitude quickly, punching into thicker air as it climbed. The glow of the tower fell away beneath them.

  Mari burst into the cockpit and found a singular hamster behind the controls, barely able to see out the window. It turned to Mari with a grin and shouted over the rattle of the ship, “Welcome back aboard, captain! She’s all yours. But you gotta come take it, because if I let go I’m pretty sure I’ll fall.”

  Its small body dangled by a single paw from the controls as the ship's angle of attack shifted and gravity pressed sideways through the cockpit. A smaller version of the control circlet rested around the hamster’s head.

  “You guys are heroes,” Mari said, forcing her way across the angled floor.

  Relieving the Derf, she took the controls and leveled the ship enough to stabilize.

  The hamster scrambled up onto her shoulder and produced a small multi-tool. “Let me help you. I think I can get that collar off.”

  It worked quickly. Metal clicked. The collar released and fell to the floor.

  “Alrighty, that should do it,” the Derf said. “I've gotta get back to the engine room if we want any chance of making it out of here.” It scurried off, disappearing through the hatch.

  Lunda’s reassuring presence rushed into their minds, filling the space where fear had been accumulating. I’m so glad you all made it back safely. I felt our connection sever and knew we needed to do something. So I got the Derfs to help me execute a rescue. First, we repaired the ship. That proved easy after I hacked into the Borruki network and channeled their energy supply. The hamsters fabricated the parts from there. It was all quite simple, actually.

  You’re amazing, Lunda, Jerro sent, his thought riding on equal parts relief and disbelief. These hamsters are mad lads. I couldn’t get the Derf off the turret.

  Greg joined in from the fore turret. Yeah, this one just kept blasting until I ripped it off the seat by force.

  Mari exhaled shakily and turned her attention inward, reaching for the chronoarch the way Rufus had taught her. Alright. Let’s get out of here.

  It came quicker than last time. Natural, reflexive, almost like the motion had been waiting behind her ribs.

  The chromatic waterfall formed as sound distorted. Instead of moving through it, everything froze. Time itself felt held, suspended in a crystal stillness that made Mari’s skin prickle.

  Mari Stonepaw, the Queen’s voice entered her singular mind without invitation. It would seem I’ve underestimated you and your friends.

  Greg’s thought came sharp. Mari, is everything okay? Why’s the transit frozen?

  Jerro responded from the rear turret. No—everything is not okay. We’re being held back by a ship.

  It’s not the ship holding us, Mari sent, frustration tightening her words.

  The emblem on her forehead began to glow. Color drained from the chromatic fall as transit reversed, yanking them backward out of escape, the whole universe cinched tight by the throat.

  Hang on. We’re going home, Mari sent, blunt and final.

  The triple diamond crest coursed with hot blue energy. She stepped away from the panel, and her body shuddered. A translucent silhouette of Mari remained at the controls, holding the ship steady.

  Mari leaned down to Phlip, pressing her head to his, nose to nose, a moment that was too small for what it carried. Then she patted Squiggy’s head, gentler than her urgency allowed. Squiggy’s eyes widened, something in her going still, sensing a goodbye she didn’t have language for.

  Mari turned and sprinted out of the cockpit. All four limbs accelerated in coordination.

  Her speed increased rapidly, leaving a blue energy streak behind her as she dove off the back of the ship, plummeting toward the smaller vessel holding them back. The enemy ship deployed cannons and sent a barrage into her, but the bolts deflected as a tight pod of energy formed around her body.

  We burrow, Mari broadcasted calmly. The words carried more weight than instruction. They carried intention.

  Mari impacted the ship, the Queens presence inside. It ruptured into halves, debris tumbling toward the planet’s surface. A shockwave rippled outward, shifting from bright indigo into fiery yellow as it dissipated.

  The projected Mari in the cockpit guided the controls as their ship lurched forward, riding the shockwave and slipping into the chromatic waterfall. Phlip and Squiggy watched as Mari’s ephemeral visage pixelated into particulate, sweeping through them and then the ship as it passed into transit.

  The ship roared back into open air, the last traces of color peeling away behind them, and into a place none of them recognized. The sky was a washed, bruised color, too pale to be comforting, with thin bands of cloud stretched like torn cloth. Below, the world was sand and stone. Dunes rolled away in uneven waves, the sand swirled through with lime-green particles that caught the light in sickly flashes. Rust-colored outcrops broke the slopes in jagged seams, rising like ribs from the ground. Heat shimmered off everything, and the light had a hard edge to it, as if it didn’t belong here.

  Sound snapped back and caught up all at once. Wind hammered the hull. Grit ticked against the glass.

  Mari, Greg sent, pushing the thought outward with everything he had.

  There was no answer. No flicker. Nothing at the edge.

  His chest tightened. He tried again, sharper, then slower, changing the shape of the call, searching for any crack she could slip through. Mari. Still nothing. Only the thin pressure of his own mind meeting empty air.

  Greg unbuckled and hurried through the hull, bursting into the cockpit. Phlip and Squiggy looked up at him as he entered, their faces too open for what had just happened.

  “Where is she?” Greg shouted. The words fell into the wind and were gone.

  Jerro arrived a half step behind him and climbed into the pilot’s seat without speaking. His paws moved over the controls on instinct as he guided the ship down toward a low basin between two dune ridges, choosing a pocket where the wind broke and the rocks offered a thin kind of cover. He chose distance and didn’t look at Greg. Space was the only thing he could offer.

  The ship settled with a heavy hiss. Sand lifted and spun around them, then drifted down in a slow, relentless fall.

  Greg stood frozen in the cockpit doorway, breathing too fast. His eyes kept scanning empty seats and narrow corridors. Maybe Mari had slipped past him. Maybe she was there somewhere. His throat worked once. No sound came out.

  Phlip hopped close and pressed against Greg’s leg, glassy eyes fixed on his face, searching for the missing piece there. Squiggy crept up behind Jerro and placed one small paw on his tail. Jerro flinched, then turned and saw her trembling, the effort it took to stay upright. He pulled her into a hug without thinking, holding on the way you hold on when something has already been taken.

  Lunda was there too, quiet in the shared channel. She didn’t speak. She didn’t need to. She felt the hollow space Mari had left behind, and the grief that filled it.