Horizon Down (Galaxy Mavericks Book 9) Read online

  “Glory be to the empire,” Harlow said.

  She didn't reply.

  She didn't want to say anything.

  Her boyfriend of five weeks, who had kissed her already, was leaving.

  A drone bot hovered over her and the teacher looked at her.

  “Glory be to the empire,” she said reluctantly, and scowling.

  When she turned away, Harlow was gone, disappeared into another crowd.

  The line thinned out and she approached the pod tram, a silver ball designed for ten.

  She climbed onboard with the other sullen children, and she became one of them.

  There could be no tears.

  There could be no emotion.

  Such things from a minor were grounds for demerits against their parents.

  Yet she couldn't help but wipe away a tear as she stepped off the pod tram.

  She still hadn't received her Emergence date yet.

  Her life hung in the balance.

  Would she emerge? Would she be a sacrifice, cast into the deepest bowels of the hive?

  She walked into the entrance of her caverned neighborhood. The walls were cool and thin, with pods glinting in the darkness.

  She kept her head down as drone bots passed by, watching her every move. Watching everyone’s move.

  She nodded to every one that passed, praising the empire.

  When she arrived at a dead end where her family’s pod was, there was almost no moonlight and she had to strap on her headlight. She switched it on, and a beam of milky light illuminated the darkness. The walls crawled with moles and they scurried away, tunneling into the earth to get away from her.

  Clods of dirt fell to the ground like quiet rain.

  And then she saw them.

  Sleek, white motorcycles parked outside her home pod. Three of them, along with a box transport drone.

  Her heart stopped.

  She walked slowly past the motorcycles, whose neon stripes glowed in the darkness. The box drone hovered and hummed. Its back doors were open, and it was empty.

  How many times had she stared in the back of these drones, seeing other children transported into them? How many times had she winced when the doors slammed shut of their own accord?

  She didn’t want to walk further. She didn’t want to go home.

  She wanted to run.

  But she heard the buzzing of a drone behind her. A circular metal eye hovered in the air several yards away. It stopped and watched her.

  She gulped and took a step further.

  Loyalty forced her ahead, made her pick up her feet toward her home pod.

  The front door slid open and a stone-faced man stood in the doorway.

  “Get in,” the man said.

  Her hive father.

  She quickened her pace.

  “There’s nothing to be scared of,” he said. “It’s not what you think.”

  She breathed a sigh of relief. Her hive father took her backpack and ushered her into the warm fullness of the pod.

  Inside, in the living room, her hive mother sat on a couch with her hands in her lap. Her long, graying hair was tied behind her back, and her eyes were hard, stone hard. So many hive children had been taken from her. This would have been no different.

  She’d known her hive parents for most of her life. They were constants in her life, even though she was taken from her biological parents when she was born. They were not cruel to her like some hive parents, but they were not kind, either.

  Three soldiers stepped out of the kitchen with porcelain mugs in their hands. They drank from the mugs, laughing and smiling. They wore white armor with webs of neon green lines running through the arms and legs. Orange visors shaded their eyes. When they saw her, their smiles faded and they saluted.

  “Glory to the emperor,” she said, bowing.

  “Glory,” the three men said.

  “Madam hive mother, we thank you for your hospitality,” the lead soldier said. He was the largest of the three, suited up and built for war. He handed her his steaming mug of coffee.

  “Sit down,” he said, gesturing to the couch.

  Ren made her way slowly to the couch, sitting down with her hive mother, not taking her eyes off the men and the handcoils that hung from their waists.

  “Are you going to tell us what this is about if it’s not what we think it is?” her hive mother asked.

  “We can now lift our embargo,” the lead soldier said. “It was not our intent to cause you anxiety. My name is Dyne.”

  Silence.

  “Kid, have you been loyal to the empire?” the soldier asked.

  She nodded.

  “Have you been diligent in your studies?”

  She nodded again.

  “The records confirm it,” Dyne said. “You will be graduating from the top of your class this year. Your scores in Spaceship Calc and Creative Writing impressed the hive teachers. Your teachers and principal were considering advancing you to the senior grade next year. From my estimation, you were on track to proceed to an aristocratic rank.”

  Her hive mother gasped. “That’s fantastic. A rare honor.”

  “Very rare,” Dyne said.

  Ren shook her head. “You said were.”

  “Is she going to be a sacrifice?” her hive father asked.

  “We cannot sacrifice one as intelligent as her,” Dyne said. He stepped forward. “We hate to do this, but we must cut your education short.”

  Her eyes widened.

  “Why?” her hive father asked. “What must she do?”

  “The emperor is dead,” the soldier said.

  The words hit her hive parents hard. Her hive mother put her hands to her mouth.

  “No…”

  “He was devoured,” Dyne said. “And our empire is now under attack. We will fight back, and we will win.”

  He knelt and bowed his head.

  “We must now select the new emperor,” he said. “The lottery has chosen you, kid.”

  Her hive father stood.

  Her hive mother stood.

  Ren stood and backed away toward the door.

  “No. No. No—”

  “You must now serve our empire,” Dyne said.

  “I’m just a girl. I’m fourteen years old. I’m not—”

  “The glory is now yours,” the soldier said, standing.

  She shook her head. Her hands trembled. She couldn’t hear anymore. She couldn’t stand. She wanted to run. Her legs were weak.

  She put her hand on the door and pushed—

  Fffp!

  Something stuck on the shoulder.

  Her hands traced up her shoulder and wrapped around a golden syringe.

  She screamed.

  “We’re sorry,” Dyne said. “The process must begin now.”

  She stumbled back, fell out of the door and into the dirt outside.

  As she looked up, the soldiers crowded around her.

  The last thing she saw before blacking out was her hive mother and hive father standing in the living room, arms around each other, singing praise to the empire.

  3

  “Well, Eddie, I’d say we have a little problema,” Grayson said.

  Their corsair was dead in the middle of space. If the generator hadn't been working, they would have been weightless.

  Outside, a tow ship shaped like a barge appeared in the distance. It had large silver claws, and they extended toward the corsair.

  Grayson was happy to see it, but thinking about the bill they were going to pay didn’t make him very happy at all.

  Eddie whistled.

  “Yeah, I’d say we’re in a little trouble,” he said. “But at least we’re alive. Good thing they got here when they did. The engine’s starting to smoke.”

  Grayson fanned away a thin veil of smoke.

  Whenever you smelled smoke in space, you were either about to die or you were about to die. He didn’t feel like dying today.

  “What do you say I surprise these fellows?�
� Grayson asked.

  “What do you have in mind?” Eddie asked.

  Grayson grinned.

  He hailed the ship.

  “Buenos dias,” he said. “Me llamo es Grayson y mi amigo and I ran into a little trouble. Gracias a God that you’re here.”

  Eddie cringed.

  “Okay,” he said. “Don’t ever do that again.”

  “What?” Grayson asked. “I was just trying to speak both languages.”

  “Pretty much everything you said was wrong,” Eddie said, smacking his head. “You’re regressing.”

  “Guess that didn’t sound as good as I wanted it to.”

  The radio beeped and the skipper of the tow ship responded in Spanish.

  “Que bueno que hablas español. Estamos aquí para recoger tu avión. Córtale la fuerza para que conectemos los airloques.”

  Grayson scratched his head. “Did you pick up any of that?”

  Eddie laughed.

  He responded in Spanish, and then spoke in English.

  “Pardon my buddy here,” he said. “Power’s off. Connect the airlocks, and we’ll see you in a minute.”

  The ship shook as the claws connected to one of the corsair’s tow hooks.

  They unclicked their seatbelts and walked out of the cockpit, through the salon, and into the airlock.

  “All right, Cristobal,” Grayson said, patting Eddie on the back. “Remember the discretion.”

  “Got it, Xander.”

  The ship shook again as the second claw connected to the corsair’s second tow hook.

  “Any word from Devika?” Eddie asked.

  “Negative,” Grayson said. “She’s not responding to my texts. Something must be going on at Gargantua. Imagine she’ll call when she can. In the meantime, I’d say we’re gonna be twiddling our thumbs for a little bit.”

  The ship shook again as the tow ship’s airlock connected with the corsair’s. A loud sucking sound filled the room as the two ships formed a seal. Then an intercom beeped and the bay doors opened into the interior of the tow ship.

  Grayson and Eddie walked into the tow airlock—it was worn, like it had seen a lot of ships and passengers. The floors were scuffed and one of the overhead lights flickered.

  They stopped in the airlock and waited for a moment before a pair of footsteps drew their eyes to the front of the room.

  A Latino man in a baseball cap appeared and waved to them.

  “Thanks for picking us up,” Grayson said.

  “No problem,” the man said. “The planet Macalestern’s nearby. We’ll drop you off at a shop there. Name’s Raul.”

  “Sounds good,” Grayson said. “Thanks, Raul.”

  “We got coffee and a waiting area for you,” he said. “You caught us in the middle of a trip though, so we might not have a whole lot of coffee left.”

  “I don’t need the caffeine anyway,” Grayson said. “But my buddy Cris here wouldn’t mind a cup, would you, Cris?”

  Eddie nodded to the man.

  They followed him through the dark hallway toward a canteen at the end of the path.

  “You guys oughta be home,” Raul said. “All the weird stuff happenin’ lately, we’ve been telling people to avoid space travel. The way things are, you might not come back.”

  “Isn’t that the truth,” Grayson said.

  “You guys traveling?” Raul asked.

  “You could say that,” Grayson said. “But our journey’s over.”

  “Your ship’s got some fire damage,” Raul said. “Get into a fight?”

  “Ran into some pirates,” Grayson said.

  “There are a lot of Arguses in these parts,” Raul said.

  Grayson groaned. “The last thing I need right now is a couple of pigs on my hands.”

  They entered the canteen. There was a single table, with a television mounted in the corner of the ceiling.

  They watched a news report of the aftermath at Gargantua.

  “It’s a shame,” Raul said, taking off his cap. “What’s our galaxy coming to?”

  Grayson and Eddie said nothing.

  The ship shook and an alarm sounded. Lights in the ceiling flashed.

  “What’s going on?” Grayson asked.

  Raul ran out of the canteen and Eddie and Grayson followed him up a stairwell to the bridge, where a Latina woman was navigating the ship. She wore a baseball cap, too.

  “We’ve got invaders,” the woman said.

  “Load the weapons, Marisol,” Raul said.

  Outside, something shadowed the windshield of the bridge.

  Grayson whistled.

  “Oh boy,” he said.

  A fleet of triangular ships cruised through space. There were dozens of them, gray and glistening in the darkness.

  The ship’s radio exploded with crackling sounds, squeals, and grunting.

  “Pa-bok bok ong-pa gwa pa!”

  Grayson cursed under his breath.

  The ships passed over the tow ship in V formation and left it alone. But the squealing continued.

  “Bok! Bok! Bok!”

  “That’s a lot of pork chops,” Raul said.

  “Are they launching an attack?” Eddie asked. “That’s some great timing—kick us while we’re down, scrambling, and missing a couple of planets.”

  “They’ve probably been watching and waiting,” Grayson said.

  “They're headed to Macalestern,” Marisol said.

  He rested his head against the windshield. He thumped it against the glass.

  And then he thumped it again.

  And again.

  And again.

  4

  Smoke faded in and out of consciousness.

  The world blurred by, black and white, as if it were a film negative. The air sweltered around him, an optical illusion of its own, making the sky look fuzzy like it was covered in welts.

  Hundreds of jawless mouths…

  Munching.

  Chomping.

  Swarming.

  Buzzing.

  Earth cracking.

  Sand shifting.

  The world spun around and he was so dizzy he couldn't keep his eyes open.

  He hung his head and closed his eyes.

  “Wake up.”

  A hand slapped Smoke on the wrist.

  He didn't open his eyes.

  The hand slapped him again.

  He blinked his eyes open, fluttered his eyelids to focus.

  A broad-shouldered man stood in front of him. He had a long, square face with a severe jaw, and he wasn't much of a smiler.

  Smoke tried to focus.

  Everything behind the man…beyond the man…

  Was black and white.

  And above—a moon. A crumbling moon whose soil was falling, falling through the sky onto a landscape of cracked soil.

  “What…the…where the hell am I?”

  “Boss, he's awake,” Huxley said.

  But Smoke hung his head again and slept.

  Smoke felt a wetness all over his body and woke up gasping.

  He was drenched.

  Someone had thrown water all over him.

  Another man. The colors were a blur and Smoke couldn't focus.

  A hand seized him by the jaw and directed his gaze.

  “So here's the deal,” the man said.

  His face was inches from Smoke’s.

  “You need to wake up. God knows I've already spent too much time in this godforsaken place.”

  “I…know…you,” Smoke said.

  The man laughed.

  “You bet you do. And you're mine.”

  Smoke was too weak to fight back.

  “Dorian,” he said. “Dorian McAllister.”

  The man laughed. First quietly, then louder and louder. All around him, several people laughed.

  He closed his eyes again, sick to his stomach.

  When he opened his eyes again, the air was cold.

  He lay on the floor.

  A freezing, metal floor.


  He was next a window.

  Hyperspace.

  He was on a ship.

  It was moving.

  Fast.

  He felt a nudge on his hip, and he winced.

  Huxley stared down at him.

  “How was your nap?” he asked.

  Smoke closed his eyes again, but this time, he couldn't sleep.

  A metal clang forced him to open his eyes.

  Huxley threw down a tray of food.

  Filet mignon and asparagus. A chalice of red wine. A ramekin with creme brûlée.

  “Beats the hell out of penitentiary food,” Hux said. “Don't worry, it's not poisoned or anything.”

  Smoke looked around.

  He was on a bridge. Several men and women commanded the ship. They wore black and white suits and navigated quietly.

  Dorian stood in front of the windshield. Then he turned around.

  “Only the finest food on this ship,” he said, grinning. “And my name’s Florian, by the way. Florian Macalestern. Those darn false memories chewed your brain up something awful.”

  Smoke pushed the tray away.

  “Eat,” Florian said. “You've got to be weaker than a cock after an orgy.”

  Smoke blinked.

  “Don't pull any of that creepy cyborg crap with me,” Florian said. “It won't work.”

  Silence.

  “Eat!” Florian cried. “I'm not going to ask you again.”

  Smoke looked at Florian. Then he looked at the food. Slowly, he picked up the fork and ate.

  The red wine was oaky and dry. He felt the buzz instantly. Must have been his empty stomach.

  Florian strolled across the bridge, taking the long way around before approaching Smoke.

  “Congratulations,” Florian said. “You're no longer on Defestus. In fact, Defestus isn't even on Defestus anymore. It has been wiped off the star maps.”

  Smoke cut his steak into long, bloody strips.

  “You can thank me for saving you,” Florian said. “Though I don't expect you to.”

  Smoke bit into a strip of meat and chewed, ignoring Florian. He concentrated on the food.

  “But here's the thing,” Florian said. “You're not free.”

  He reached Smoke and circled him like a vulture.

  “You're a wanted man,” Florian said. “That is, if people find out you're still alive.”

  “What do you want?” Smoke asked.