Elva was one of the few Evoli in the resistance. Her people had been at war with the Tholosians for over five hundred years, the two empires competing for resources across their separate galaxies as their populations expanded. With the Tholosian resource-rich planet Charon experiencing a mass die-off as a result of an asteroid strike, the Empire’s food stores were strained to support all their citizens. They were desperate to conquer the farming planets owned by the Evoli.
Elva’s knowledge was vital to the resistance; the Evoli tech she wove into the machines made them sing. Though the Tholosians at Nova had been deprogrammed of the Oracle’s influence, superstition ran deep, and some still whispered that the Evoli were majoi, especially their leaders, the Oversouls. Sorcerers that knew your every thought and emotion. They claimed no secret was safe. That they’d eat children, sucking the marrow from their bones.
Elva didn’t even eat meat.
“Elva!” Clo called. “Can I borrow your welder? Mine’s sunk!”
The woman nodded, crossing over to pass it to Clo. The sun highlighted the darker dapples in her red-gold hair, throwing her features into sharp relief. They were a pretty people, the Evoli. Taller, almost ethereal, even when covered in engine grease. Unfair.
“You need a hand?” Elva asked, her Evoli accent soft.
“Nah, I got it. Just need to threaten her a bit more.”
Elva flashed a grin and loped back to her work.
Clo reconnected the wires, even though she’d already done it three times this morning. Maybe if she tied them up extra tight. Her fingertips were callused and nicked with scars from endless hours in machines. Clo climbed out of the engine and swung herself into the cockpit, grunting as too much weight hit her bad leg. She had a hole in the left knee of her trousers—Kyla would be right brackish when she saw it—and the dull silver of her prosthetic caught the artificial lights. She rubbed the part where skin met metal. She could never tell how much pain was physical and how much mental.
Clo started the flight sequence, whispering a halfhearted prayer to whatever gods were listening—if any—then tapped her left shoulder, an old good-luck movement from her childhood. She’d tried to translate it to her commander once. Closest she got was: Never let the water level of the swamp go above yer shoulder, or ye’ll be head-deep in shite.
The engine fired to life. And then it purred.
“Yes, my beaut!” Clo called, slapping the walls.
While the spacecraft quivered, she tapped her mech cuff and ran diagnostics, watching the readings with bated breath. Green lights. Atmosphere fully regulated. The temperature cooled from the inside of an oven to perfectly pleasant. Clo could smell herself, like old cooked onions. At that moment, she didn’t care. Her ship worked.
She tapped out a message to the guard at headquarters that she was giving the Valkyrie a test run and got the all clear. She fired up the launch sequence and the Valkyrie gathered speed, skimming along the fire-gold sand before swerving up, up, rising above the ocher and brilliant orange mountains of Nova and into the purple of the sky.
Clo let out a whoop, hands dancing across the controls, and the ship moved like an extension of herself. She sluiced through the atmosphere and up into the stars. Nova grew smaller in the distance.
It was only up there, in the darkness of space, that she felt truly at home. More than the old Snarled swamp of her childhood, more than the sweltering Novantae desert. One circuit of the planet, and then she’d touch back down and make sure everything was still functioning. Or maybe she could chance two orbits. A little more fun.
Clo probably should have shrugged into a pressure suit in case the ship’s atmosphere gave up, but she’d been too impatient. Kyla had basically grounded her since she lost her leg. No more reconnaissance, no more stealing ships from Tholosians. Much as she loved fixing engines, she was bogging bored.
She was a quarter around Nova when she got the call. “Cloelia,” Kyla said, voice crackling over the ship comms. “I’m switching over to Pathos. Answer it this time.”
Clo had a habit of ignoring her Pathos when she was working on engines, even though Kyla yelled at her not to. <Hey, Kyla,> Clo said, cautiously, all traces of Snarl gone from her voice. She sounded just like any other vial-grown Imperial. She shouldn’t be in trouble. She’d gotten the all clear.
<Touch back down. We need you at headquarters.>
<Right now?> Clo asked, fighting down annoyance. No second orbit for her.
<I have a mission for you.>
Clo’s pulse sped up. <About time. I’ll just finish my circuit.>
Kyla let out a short laugh. <We’ll see how happy you are when you find out what it is. Have fun.>
Clo’s hands tightened on the controls. From above, the planet looked even more like fire. The oranges and rust of the mountains, the yellow sand. All of it interspersed with the dusky blue of small, rare pockets of water dotted along the planet’s surface.
Most of Nova was practically uninhabitable due to the massive storms that covered almost the entire planet’s surface in dust. Novan headquarters were nestled in a valley surrounded by high desert mountains, protected from the brunt of the winds. Even then, the occasional storm rocked the facility. The resistance was forced to pump most of their water from deep underground.
A tiny, overheated planet in a forgotten corner of the galaxy. The stronghold of the resistance, hidden in the outermost quadrant of the Iona Galaxy—still Tholosian territory, but barely acknowledged. Full of stubborn, fierce fighters, determined to be a thorn in the Empire’s side.
There were no illusions on Nova. It would take time and effort to topple the Imperial family. But maybe, if the resistance grew and flourished, they could make a difference. Skirmish by skirmish, ship by ship, soldier by soldier freed of the Oracle’s programming.
One. At. A. Time.
And maybe, she thought wryly, long after my aged corpse is launched intae space, those shitegoblins will be off the throne.
Clo landed right where she’d started. The Valkyrie X-501 set down like a dream. As she swung out of the cockpit, she uselessly patted at the shirt of her oil-splattered uniform. There was sand in the creases of the fabric, and her buttons were tarnished despite a polish from the harsh wind. She looked a damn mess.
<Do I have time to wash and change clothes?> Clo asked Kyla as she motioned for Felix, one of the other mechanics, to bring the Valkyrie back into the hangar.
<No,> Kyla said.
<Seriously? I stink. Like sweat and oil.>
Clo could practically hear Kyla’s annoyed sigh. <Now, Cloelia.>
She broke into a reluctant run, grumbling at the use of her full name. Only her mother had called her Cloelia, and only when she had been well salted with her daughter.