Which means for one whole week, I’m gonna get to run around with other kids my own age without getting dragged away all the time for lessons or family dinners or serious talks about “the state of the empire” and “my role in society.”
Uncle Atar says it’s important for all of us to hang out, that it promotes bonding.
Uncle Charlie calls it “sanctioned hooliganism” and walks around angry-sighing more than usual.
He sounds a lot like Mr. Odo does right now.
“I understand that your head isn’t really in it at the moment, Miss Faroshti,” he says, turning back toward the display screen at the front of the room. “But this is a vital part of imperial history that directly affects—”
There’s a beep, and the door to the room whooshes open. Uncle Atar fills the doorway, and a rush of excitement hits me. Because there’s only one reason I can think of why he’d be busting up lesson time right now. I jump out of my seat.
“Are they here?”
A wide smile breaks across his face. “Yes, Alyssa. They’re here.”
Five
Stardate: 0.05.15 in the Year 4031, under the stewardship of Enkindler Ilysium Wythe, that prick
Location: A godsdamned hyperlight lane with a side of hangover
I’VE BEEN THIS SIDE OF DRUNK FOR ALMOST A week.
I’m not saying it’s bad or anything, but . . . it’s definitely not great. Like I’m-getting-looks-from–Hell Monkey kind of not-great, and that guy’s never met a shot glass he wasn’t interested in seeing the bottom of.
His side-eyes might not be about the booze, though.
Might be about everything else.
Almost definitely about everything else.
Holy sunballs, I should’ve sobered up before we jumped into hyperlight. What the hell was I thinking? This is some rookie-level bullshit. I should know better.
Don’t throw up, don’t throw up, don’t throw up.
A headache hammers against my skull like a barrage of asteroids, but we’re almost at Gloo so I’m trying to hold it together. If I try to make a run for the bathroom or some painkillers, I’m almost positive I’ll hork it all over the Vagabond’s deck. Better to stay still. Very, very still.
“How you doin’ over there, Cap?” Hell Monkey calls from the jump seat to my left.
I shut my eyes. Against the headache. Against the question. Against the question underneath the question.
“Fan-flipping-tastic. Never better. Now shut up.”
This is the longest I’ve had to sit still in days, and I hate it. Haaaaate it. Uncle Atar passed away hours after I got to the kingship, and the sonofabitch left this enormous, invisible bruise all over me. Asshole.
Gods, I miss him.
Charlie and I were with him. When he died. Had maybe ten whole minutes with our grief, and then reality came pouring in. Officials and assistants with worthless condolences and a bunch of pricks who started yapping about “next steps” and “the good of the empire.” I just ran. Nabbed an unattended waveskimmer in one of the hangar bays and took off over the Eastern Sea. Flew around for hours seeing just. how. close. I could get to those massive breakers before I had to pull up.
The next few days were horseshit. Funeral plans, event coordination, fake sympathy . . . And then they took my ship away from me. I couldn’t even put hyperdrive lights to that place and blow. Nope, they had to outfit the Vagabond Quick for the crownchase. All of us are supposed to start with the same tech in our worldcruisers. AIs, engine upgrades, weapons—it all has to be equal. Evens the playing field or whatever. I thought Hell Monkey was gonna haul off and deck the officials when they started putting their ugly mitts all over everything.
At least they didn’t touch Rose. She’s apparently already running off the system they’re installing in all the other ships, so they let her be.
Me, I just hid at the bottom of a bottle until Charlie found me, peeled me off the floor, and put me back on my ship. As soon as I boarded, they injected a biometric monitor into the back of my neck. (Gotta make sure all of us stay breathing and no one shoves us into a solar flare, right?) Then they put trackers all over the ship, uploaded crownchase rules into our computer, and sent us off to Gloo.
I’m out of booze now. And I’m out of time.
My eyes burn, and I squeeze them tight. Get it together, Farshot. Don’t show up at Gloo in tears or with vomit on your face.
The Vagabond Quick drops out of the hyperlight lane, and my whole body goes soft with relief. Even my headache feels a little better. Hyperlight is a quick way to get around, but damn, it’s hell on a hungover person.
Gloo fills the windows, squat and kinda brownish all over. Exactly what the word Gloo sounds like? That’s how the planet looks. Good people down there, but they got the rough end on planetary aesthetics.
A yellow light flashes on the dash. A broadcast signal from the media feeds. And a text comm from Charlie to go with it.
It is time, Alyssa. I will not be able to communicate with you again until this is all over, but know that I wish you all my best.
Charles Viqtorial
I stare at that last line. I wish you all my best. For buttoned-up, tamped-down Charlie, that line is . . . a hug, really. And it’s the same thing he said to me three years ago, right before I took off for good on the Vagabond.
My eyes burn again. This ship must have a bad air filter somewhere. Or something.
Hell Monkey’s hand hovers over a button on the dash, but his eyes are on me. Steady. Loyal. That’s Hell Monkey.
“You ready for this?”
No. But not watching the broadcast won’t help. “Hit it.”
Gloo is replaced on the viewscreen by a live feed of the official throne room on the kingship. One whole wall of the room is windows overlooking the Eastern Sea, and the ship itself rotates so you can see both the sunrise and sunset from there, so it’s a pretty killer space if you like a great view—which I do. It’s also decked out in the official royal Faroshti colors of ice blue and gold—which I look terrible in and hate.
Standing in front of the dais where Uncle Atar should’ve been are Charlie and two others I’m far less excited to see: Enkindler Wythe, who’s somehow managed to go from ambassador to councilmember to imperial steward in a few short years, and Cheery Coyenne, prime family matriarch and executive in charge of the Daily Worlds, which means she controls just about everything that hits the media feeds. Cheery is nice enough, as long as what you want and what she wants line up, but Wythe’s smug face up there makes me want to punch something.
Preferably him.
“. . . the long and storied history of this contest,” Charlie is saying. He’s speaking Imperial, the empire’s only recognized common tongue, but it looks like they’re live translating it into at least a hundred different languages so no one misses anything. “Anyone who attempts to kill or capture a crownchaser will be subjected to immediate execution. Any crownchaser who kills a fellow crownchaser before the seal has been found will be sentenced accordingly, and their entire family line will be disqualified from the contest.”
Sounds like we’re a few minutes late to the party—Charlie’s already done the formal recitations of crownchase history and the rules of the contest. Not that there are that many, besides “don’t kill each other” and “first back with the seal wins.” If history is anything to go by, it’s kind of a free-for-all once the flag goes up, and all the extra stuff they’re foisting on us—the cameras, the bots, the drones—is just to help them broadcast the spectacle to trillions of media feeds around the galaxy.