Page 15

FIFTEEN

Cerani

Cerani paced the length of Stavian’s room—their room. Her boots thudded softly across the polished floor. The insulation in the soles muffled each step, but these were not the soft slippers she’d been wearing for nearly four cycles. These were miner’s boots. She tapped her fingers against her thigh, then crossed her arms. Then, she stopped pacing and stood under the wide glass ceiling, staring up at the red haze of FK-22R’s atmosphere.

Nothing out there had changed. The twin moons still cast their faint glow. The sky still looked like it was bleeding. The surface winds would still tear the skin off anyone caught outside without an EP suit.

But something was changing.

Tonight—during sleep cycle—they were leaving.

Her new EP suit fit snug against her. This wasn’t the type issued to miners; those were generic and always too loose in the joints. This suit bore no Axis tag. The helmet sat on the bed. It magnetized to the neck of the suit and was fitted to her size. Stavian had retrieved it all from long-term storage inventory and burned the requisition code afterward himself. The suit was necessary. All EP suits, including hers and the miners’, had built-in gravity stabilizers that were helpful for anyone planning to stay connected to the floor whilst on a starship. It was planning for details like this that made her think they could pull this off.

She flexed her hand inside the glove. Her sigh came out steadier than she expected it to be.

The room still smelled like him—like clean metal, salt, and something else underneath, like tilled soil after a rain. She glanced at the bed and remembered that sleep cycle together, where he’d pulled her close and said, “I keep waking up just to see if you’re still here.”

When he wasn’t on duty, she and Stavian had planned for all possibilities they could think of, and carved out precious time to love each other. They slept tangled together, hands exploring, mouths and bodies and hearts locked deep into the sleep cycle.

Everyone at the mining compound assumed the obvious—that the infamous prisoner 630-I had become the controller’s personal companion. “Pet” was the demeaning term the Axis officials used for her. They figured she brought him food and warmed his bed and was rewarded with soft sheets and relief from shift duty. No one questioned it—it wasn’t entirely inaccurate—and Stavian didn’t deny it. It kept scrutiny off them. If the controller was a little distracted, or not present in his office as much, well, he needed to unwind a little. It was the privilege of upper command to use prisoners as they saw fit, after all. Stavian told her that Darven made smirky, offhand comments about “new tastes” and “keeping the joints oiled,” and that his lieutenant had stopped questioning his decisions. Cerani was the easy excuse for Stavian’s frequent absences from the mine.

Cerani found enormous relief in letting them all think what they wanted. She even played the part when someone watched. She nodded when medics passed her in the corridor and smiled just enough to make it believable. She even did her hair and wore the lightweight tunics and pants that Stavian had sent in for her. Her new role was easy to play. No one suspected she was part of a plan that would upend the workings of the DeLink Mine.

No one would guess that this was the cycle in which she’d lead all forty-eight prisoners onto a hijacked Axis ship. No one except the forty-eight miners, that is. She’d gotten the plan to Jorr and Sema privately, during a trip to the med lab in which Stavian had taken her for a post-treatment scan. She hoped to fek that they had done what she’d asked and spread the word. The last thing she needed was for a bunch of surprised, disoriented miners to bombard her with questions when she arrived at the barracks.

A ping sounded on her wrist.

Her breath caught. She looked down.

—confirmed: commence barracks extraction

Cerani’s fists clenched. She stared at the message once more, making sure it hadn’t changed.

—confirmed: commence barracks extraction

That was it. No flourishes. No “good luck.” Just go.

She crossed the room in three fast strides and grabbed her helmet from the bed. It locked onto the neck of her suit with a soft click. Her pack sat next to the exit—a small black case with extra filters, gloves, med patches, and a sealed pouch of nutrient squares. She’d reviewed the packing list five times already. Nothing inside would slow her down.

She glanced around the room one last time. The bed had been made. The sheet, smooth. The corners, tucked sharp. This would be the last Axis facility she lived in. She clutched the case and opened the door.

The hallway outside was empty, as expected. No surprise sweep. No guards. Not at this time. Miners were supposed to be asleep. The admin quarters were dead quiet.

Waiting near the lift, the mech Stavian had reassigned stood at alert. A black model with a blank faceplate and twin emitter pods mounted at its shoulders, turned toward her. Its optical light blinked once. “Escort confirmed,” it said in a quiet, mechanical voice.

Cerani nodded. “Let’s go.”

They exited onto the surface platform without a word. The transition air lock hissed open and blew warm pressurized air into the lift chamber. When the outer door opened, the cold of FK-22R’s surface conditions slapped hard.

She followed the mech down the paved pathway. Dust swept sideways across the red ground in long ribbons. The wind screamed above them, but the suit buffered most of it. She reached up and checked her helmet seal, which she needed for the weather conditions. Solid.

They moved quickly across the surface.

From here, she could see the full sprawl of the DeLink 22K barracks. Five hundred meters ahead, the rectangular metal building crouched behind a windscreen wall. Its dull gray cladding was chipped and stained. The lights above the only door pulsed red—standby mode for sleep cycle. Just like every other night.

No one was outside. She saw no motion near the roof or the mech station. Good signs. Everything looked routine.

The reprogrammed mech moved in front of her when they reached the door scanner. A small burst of light flicked from the mech’s visual scanner and the barracks door unlocked with a muted chime. The heavy steel surface slid back.

Cerani adjusted her grip on the pack and followed close behind.

Inside, the air was thick with recycled heat, stale and heavy. The lights were dim. Lines of low bunks stacked three-high lined the room. Inmate tags were stenciled on metal plates at the foot of the bunks. Most of the miners were in their assigned bunks in the dark, but she wondered how many were actually sleeping. The Axis mech assigned to the barracks stood in its usual position—front-left wall, posture locked, sensor light tracking slow lines across the interior, checking for inmate movement. It was in passive observation mode, but alert.

Cerani breathed in once and stepped forward, hands at her sides.

The mech with her made almost no sound on the reinforced floor. Its frame was sleeker by comparison, built for more than monitoring and basic perimeter checks. Stavian had pulled records on it three cycles ago, said it had once served in an off-platform tactical unit before being repurposed for surface mines. He’d spent two cycles rewriting its protocol stream. Now, it belonged to them.

The moment they’d cleared the entryway, the reprogrammed mech’s shoulder pods flared. No light. No alarm. Just a nearly invisible flicker, like static moving over its plates. A static sound filled the room—a noise Cerani felt in her teeth more than heard.

The Axis mech’s head turned slightly. It started a low-alert cycle, a soft rising tone from its vocal unit. But before it could engage the alarm, the black mech struck.

It moved fast—one lethal appendage shot out into the guard mech’s vent panel. There was no dramatic crash, no messy sparks, just a hard crack and a hiss as the Axis unit’s core blinked out. It went still and its scanning light faded to black.

Cerani’s heartbeat pulsed in her ears. This had been one of the parts she’d been nervous about. Mechs had always been terrifying. There was no talking with them, explaining things to them. They were machines with one objective—keeping prisoners in line.

Cerani exhaled. She no longer felt like a prisoner, though.

The reprogrammed mech eased back into its neutral stance. “Axis guard deactivated,” it said. “Command input?”

“Get them up. All of them. Use sub-audible pattern six.”

“Confirmed.”

The mech’s outer chest panel opened, revealing a small emitter node tucked inside its chassis. It pulsed once—a soft thrum that Cerani scarcely felt—but she knew what it was doing. Pattern six delivered a vibration keyed to Axis suit resonance, enough to stir any miners who might be sleeping and signal to those who were awake that the coast was clear.

Within moments, there was movement across the barracks. Miners sat up and moved to the edges of their bunks.

Jorr was up first. He crossed to her quickly. A dark smudge still spread beneath one eye, but his posture was strong, his movements sharp. “Cerani?” he asked, his voice gravel-deep and still bearing a trace of pain. “Are we…?”

“Yes.” She stepped forward. “It’s time.”

People moved faster then.

Blankets were thrown off. Miners climbed down bunk ladders in practiced silence. Nobody shouted. Not a single sound rose above a murmur. Every one of them had been waiting with their EP suits on and helmets at hand.

Rinter pushed off the lower bunk. He gave her a nod. “You sure?”

“Yes,” Cerani said. She looked around the room. Her gaze swept across them all. “Helmets on. Take what you need and leave the rest.”

They moved.

Every footlocker cracked open with clicks and soft creaks. Most of them held little worth taking—threads of personal cloth, trinkets from home they’d smuggled in, or ration scraps folded into cloth pouches.

Sema walked toward her with a slight limp, all that was left of an injury that would have been fatal if not for the medical treatment. “The Axis is going to let us go just like that?”

“No,” Cerani said. “But we’re going anyway.”

Sema nodded once, firmly, and pulled her helmet over her head.

The reprogrammed mech stood beside the fallen Axis unit without comment. No alerts had been sent. Stavian’s override stream was working. Cerani’s breath came easier once she was sure the door had stayed closed. The mine hadn’t noticed.

Yet.

Jorr joined her near the central aisle. He hadn’t buckled his EP suit closed yet and carried his helmet under one arm. “How long until they realize?”

Cerani kept her eyes on the others. “Depends on who’s watching the logs. We have until the security queues flag an anomaly. That gives us twelve, maybe fifteen peks. Twenty, if we’re lucky.”

Jorr winced. “Not a lot of margin.”

“No,” she said. “But it’s enough.”

Around them, the room turned into quiet activity. Elba was helping a younger worker tie the back of their suit. Toval was double-checking his air pack straps, and two others were folding a thin blanket over the fallen Axis mech like it was trash to be taken out later. Cerani moved between groups, checking seals, handing out filters and reinforced gloves from her pack.

She stopped beside the youngest group—three miners barely out of adolescence. Their hands moved too fast, and their faces were too pale.

“Breathe slower,” she said to one of them, a thin, purple-skinned female with a broken tusk and a patched visor tucked under her arm. “Your helmet’s fine. But shaking hands won’t help you fit it faster.”

The female nodded stiffly and pressed her hands to the scanner to check her oxygen levels.

Cerani turned and found Jorr by the back wall, crouched over the low supply shelf. He was rolling ration squares into a slim pouch. Beside him, Sema gathered up water pouches with quiet focus. Even her eyes looked different—clearer. Ready.

Cerani crossed toward them and placed one hand on Sema’s shoulder. “Stay by the younger group. Don’t let anyone fall behind when we move.”

“Got it.”

Jorr slung the pouch over his shoulder and straightened. His expression was quieter than usual. “We did as you asked,” he said, his voice low. “What is the rest of the plan?”

Cerani didn’t immediately answer. She listened to the near-silence around them. The shuffle of boots. The click of seals. Breathing. Steady. Unhurried.

Then she looked at him. “There’s a ship in the hangar bay. The ESS Mirka. It’s waiting for us. The controller—Stavian—will fly it away from here.” It sounded painfully simplistic when she put it that way. There was no time to explain the intense planning that had gone into this.

His brows lifted. “You trust the controller?”

“With my life.” She raised her chin.

“And this ship,” Jorr said. “Is it an Axis ship?”

“It was,” she replied. “It’s ours now.”

“That’s…a risk.” He scrubbed a hand over his jaw. “You know what’ll happen if they catch us.”

“We’ll be killed,” she said. “But we’ll be killed here anyway, if we stay. Why not go on our terms?”

He stared at her, then finally gave one sharp nod. “Why not, indeed.”

She swallowed. Fek , they trusted her. With their lives. With everything. The gravity of that was a sobering blow. She refused to let them down.

“Time to go,” she said. Then she raised her voice, just enough to reach the entire barracks. “Everyone in line. Quiet steps. Six rows of eight.” Except for her. She’d be leading them. “Helmets on. We move as one.”

No one hesitated. Boots scraped gently along the floor as the miners fell into formation with the kind of precision she’d only ever seen from soldiers. There was no panic, no last-minute fumbling. They were ready. Cerani could feel it in the way the quiet settled. The way every face turned toward her now, eyes steady inside their helmets, waiting for her next word.

She took one long breath and placed her helmet over her head. The magnetic seal locked in place with a faint click. Her environmental readout tracked across the inside of the visor. Green. Good.

“Open the door,” she said to the mech through the comm.

It responded with a chirp. “Opening in five… Four…”

Cerani turned and faced the group behind her. Her people from all over the quadrant. Some were from species she couldn’t even name. They weren’t weak. They weren’t broken. They were survivors, every one of them.

She raised her hand. “Once we cross the threshold, we run. Don’t stop for anything. If you fall, you get up. If someone can’t get up and you’re near them, you help. No one gets left behind. Understood?”

Helmet beacons nodded back—forty-eight signals blinking in unison.

“Three… Two…”

The outer shutter began to pull open. Cerani gritted her teeth as the wind howled against her suit.

“One.”

The door opened up. The storm had grown worse, the wind cutting sideways across the surface with sharp lines of reddish haze.

She didn’t wait for more. “Go!”

She ran. The mech moved beside her, keeping pace as she pounded into the storm. Sand pinged against her helmet like needles. Her boots hit hard, steady. Behind her, the line of miners burst forward, fast and focused. The newer suits—reinforced and better sealed—held strong. No slowdowns. No stumbles.

The Mirka was in the hangar ahead. The wind slammed harder the closer they got to the edge of the compound wall. Cerani lifted her arm and signaled right. The black mech veered forward, cutting a clean path to the access bay. She reached the hatch first and smacked the exterior sensor with her gloved hand. The door slid open with a rough mechanical groan—just enough clearance for one row at a time.

“Inside!” she yelled through the comm. “Grab a weapon from the rack only if you know how to use it. Everyone else, go straight to the cargo hold.”

She ducked under the frame and entered the holding corridor, blinking against the haze on her visor. Footsteps echoed behind her as the miners came through in rows, boots slapping the floor, suits scraped with dust. Elba ducked in beside Rinter. Toval followed behind, shoulders hunched as he braced for a fight that didn’t come. Once they were all in, the mech stepped back and turned to the group.

“Outer corridor secure,” it said.

Cerani opened the inner hatch. It dragged upwards with a groan, and the moment it cleared, the dock lay wide before them.

Dock 4B stretched wide, lit with overhead panels that sent streaks of light across the floor. Crates were sealed to the side. A half-dismantled drone cart sat in the corner. The ESS Mirka sat at the heart of it all like an invitation—squat, scarred, and thick-bodied. The vessel was like a sleek pulse of power in a sea of metal and rage. The lights along the sides of the hull blinked green. Its ramp was already extended and waiting. A miracle.

Cerani clenched her jaw. “Hangar is clear. Move.”

She led the group out, watching every step, every shadow. Behind her, the miners flooded the hangar—quiet, with suits coated in dust. As planned, no one spoke. Six rows. Narrow formation. The mech took rear position, escorting the last wave like an empty threat in case someone tried to interfere.

Cerani’s boots pounded against the deck as they crossed toward the ship’s ramp—just one bright strip across the dock floor, flanked by small lights that blinked blue on approach.

At the top of the ramp stood Stavian—her lover, mate, partner—just inside the bay, armored and ready.

The sight of him hit her chest so hard she almost forgot to breathe. Fek , he was magnificent.

He stood perfectly still, helmet in one hand, dark armor gleaming under the hangar lights. His wings were extended just enough to mark who he was. His eyes locked on her through her helmet’s visor.

Cerani didn’t slow down. She climbed the ramp fast, boots striking metal. At the top, she stopped right in front of him.

“We’re all here,” she said through her comm.

He dragged his free arm around her waist and pulled her to his side as his gaze swept behind her to the line still filing up the ramp. “Then it’s time to leave. For the first and last time.”