Page 142 of Pets in Space 10

Fallin

The lab lay abandoned, the sentries gone.

Its corridors smelled of cold metal and old blood, though less than before.

Perhaps it was my senses, dulled by purpose.

Or perhaps something had shifted in me. I was no longer a weapon walking through his birthplace.

I was a survivor returning to reclaim it.

I’d shifted back to my smaller shape just outside, once I’d made sure there were no guards to deal with.

It was reassuring to know how easy it was to move between forms, but at the same time, I was very aware of how my larger shape was not the one I had been born in.

It had been forced upon me. Maybe one day, when we were far from here, I could bury Tyvaron once and for all.

Hazel walked beside me, her expression tight, alert. Ruby darted ahead, snout occasionally brushing the walls as if seeking out old ghosts. They didn’t scare her. Nor me. Not anymore.

We reached the control room with no resistance. No drones. No defence systems. Just the low, ever-present hum of buried power. I approached the central console and placed my hand flat against the interface. The machine came to life instantly.

“Yesterday, I removed the masters’ control over the collars, but I think there is still a residual link to the tyvarin that I can exploit.

If not, I will have to take control of the collars once more, but I would rather avoid it.

I don’t know what that would do to them when they’ve only just realised that they’re free. ”

I started changing settings and adjusting frequencies, the system’s AI guiding me in my task.

Hazel moved closer, watching over my shoulder. “What are you doing?”

“There’s a beacon in every collar – a failsafe, meant to recall us in emergencies. I can rewrite its signal. Tell them to come, not as weapons… but as allies.”

I called up the collar network. The map reappeared – thirty-one signals still active, scattered like blood drops across the jagged terrain of Kalumbu.

I adjusted the coordinates, anchoring them to a plateau a few ridgelines west of the lab.

A place I remembered from my early patrols – big enough for this many tyvarin to gather, high enough to not harbour any monsters that could be a threat, and far from any area where Trials contestants usually roamed.

We’d be in full view of drones and satellites, but that could not be helped.

The game makers already knew that I had regained control of my own mind and that I had freed my fellow tyvarin.

But they did not know what I intended to do next.

I wrote the message.

This is Tyvaron. I set you free. I have changed to who I used to be. You can as well. Come if you choose. You will be met in peace. I will explain everything.

A single pulse of energy surged from the console. Not a command. A call.

It was done.

***

The plateau was wide and weathered, marked by age and the elements but still standing strong.

We reached it by midday. The sun hung pale and gold above, casting long shadows over the stone.

A few low bushes were dotted around, bent and twisted by the wind.

Hazel helped me gather fuel for signal fires while Ruby busied herself collecting sticks and dropping it proudly at our feet.

The location ping I’d encoded in the message would lead them in this general area and the fires would show them where to land.

They were also a sign that it was really me who had sent out the call.

The masters wouldn’t bother with something as simple as a fire. They would use machines and pain.

Knowing they would not recognise me in this form, I shifted into Tyvaron once more.

The change came easy and faster than before.

Each time I shifted, I became more. More than the sum of two halves.

I was Tyvaron and I was Fallin. And someone new.

The person Hazel had fallen in love with. The one who was going to be her mate.

I started the first blaze with a breath of fire. The smoke rose in a thin column, curling skyward like a banner.

Hazel stared into the flames. “Do you think they’ll come?”

“I know they will.”

She looked doubtful but didn’t argue. Instead, she built a second fire, smaller. A comfort fire.

The first arrival came before the smoke could fully clear. A shape appeared in the sky – dark and fast, wings slicing the air. I tensed instinctively… but it landed without aggression.

A young tyvarin. Slightly smaller than me, deep green with silver accents. His eyes glowed faintly, and his movements were slow. Hesitant. He didn’t speak.

Hazel didn’t back away. She stepped forward, palms visible. “You’re safe,” she said gently. “No one’s going to hurt you.”

He stared into her eyes as if searching for proof that she was not a threat. Satisfied, he curled up on the ground. His collar was still attached, but it was lifeless and cold.

More arrived over the next hour – in pairs, alone, injured or confused. Some circled overhead for a long time before daring to land. Most were silent, but I could see the transformation in their eyes. Their minds were clearing.

A few remembered names. One looked at me and said Krexya, then choked up before he could speak again. Another wept openly when Ruby perched on his arm and chirped at him. They remembered the little one.

Hazel moved between them with cautious grace. They stared at her in wonder and confusion, as if they didn’t know what or who she was, but also sensed that she was important somehow. That she was the pebble who had first hit the lake’s surface, creating waves that were still rolling onto the shore.

She didn’t try to fix them. She didn’t pretend to understand them. She simply stayed and comforted them. That was more than they had ever experienced since their capture and transformation.

I was looking out for some tyvarin in particular, the ones I had fought with regularly, but only two of them turned up. I didn’t dare think of what had happened to the others.

As we waited for more to arrive, Hazel put her hand on my neck as we observed the crowd of tyvarin. Her other hand held Ruby, who was fast asleep on her shoulder, snout twitching in dreams.

“They came,” she said softly.

“They did.”

“Do you think they’ll want to stay?”

“I think they want to hope,” I replied. “That’s enough.”

Later, we would take those who wished it back to the lab. Offer them the machine. The others could stay here – safe, watched over, fed.

And after that?

We would see.

But right now, the winds carried no command. The skies bore no drones. And in the firelight, for the first time in generations, the tyvarin were together.

Free.

When the sun began its slow descent and the fires had burnt to smouldering embers, there were twenty-six tyvarin squeezed onto the plateau.

I roared once to gain their attention, then I told them my story.

I showed them the collar we’d taken from the fallen obsidian tyvarin.

I told them about my rebellion, how I’d refused an order, how I’d met Hazel, and how I’d entered the machine.

The chance to shift. To remember. To choose.

I told them there was no path forward without choice.

And then I shifted into Fallin to show them what was possible. They gasped, shook their wings, their eyes burning with desire to reclaim their past and their future.

Not one of them left.

***

One by one, they flew to the lab and entered the machine. I guided the first few through the process until they had recovered enough to help the next tyvarin.

Not all of them looked like me when they emerged from the lab.

Some had no wings, others had fur rather than scales, others were much smaller or bigger.

But there were three that were of my species, one female and two males.

I did not know them, did not remember them, but that did not matter.

We were kin. I knew they would fight by my side because of that alone.

I watched the shifted tyvarin as they gathered in small groups, talking, slowly relearning social skills.

Some had separated from the group, preferring to be alone, while a few more had shifted back into their tyvarin forms, finding perches along the rim of the plateau or curling up beside newly lit fires.

The transformations had exhausted them – some had emerged dazed, others shaken, and a few quietly weeping when memories returned.

Still, they had all chosen this. Chosen freedom.

And now they looked to me.

Hazel returned to my side, Ruby on her shoulder once more, still sleepy but clearly aware that something important was happening. The little one chirped, then tucked her nose beneath her wing.

I spoke without turning to Hazel. “We need a plan.”

She nodded. “You’ve gathered them. Now what?”

“We cannot win in a direct assault. The masters are not on the planet’s surface.

They are somewhere in space, orbiting Kalumbu.

They don’t need to be here, they have their drones and satellites.

But what we do have…” I glanced behind me at the sleeping tyvarin, glowing softly in the firelight, “…is unpredictability. We were meant to be mindless. Tools. They’ll never expect strategy from us.

They don’t know what’s happening. Let’s take them by surprise. ”

Hazel crouched beside a flat stone and began sketching with a bit of charred wood. “So what do we do? Sabotage? Disruption?”

“Yes.” I crouched next to her. “We turn them blind. Destroy as many drones as we can. Attack any vessel or guards they send. Until they have no choice but to come here in person.”

“Do you think they will actually come?”

“I am not sure,” I admitted. “But it is the best we can do from here. We cannot fly to the space station. Tyvarin are strong, but we cannot survive without air. Maybe we can find a way to disrupt them through their own technology, here in the lab and elsewhere.”

She reached out and gently touched the side of my neck. “Maybe some of the tyvarin have the skills we need? If they remember them from their previous lives.”

Her touch grounded me. Steadied the fire inside me.

We sat in silence, thinking, trying to come up with strategies for a situation that seemed impossible. As I racked my brain on how we could defeat the monsters who had created us, I scanned the far ridges.

And then I saw it.

A flicker of silver on the horizon. Not a star. Not a tyvarin.

A drone.

Hovering.

Watching.

I bared my teeth. “We’ve been spotted.”

Hazel rose quickly, her expression hardening. “What do we do?”

“We destroy it.”

Smoke would rise again soon – not from signal fires this time, but from war.