Chapter Forty

The disturbance reported was around here, right? I walked silently through the back alleys, keeping my senses tuned in for any sign or movement. I’d been dispatched to one of the human residential areas in response to reports of suspicious figures wandering around and causing trouble, but so far, I’d found nothing. Hell, most of the residences had their lights off by now.

I didn’t see any signs of disturbances either. Sure, there was trash in the alleys, but that was hardly unusual. The sound of melodic murmuring caught my attention, and I peered around a corner to find a group of Syldrari in rather distinctive attire—but, unfortunately, they spotted me first. I started cautiously backing away even though they didn’t make any move to reach for their weapons.

The central figure turned my direction, his face obscured down to his mouth by his hooded trench coat. Iridescent metal carvings adorned the coat with tentacles flowing upward. The bodice and shoulders were armored in the same material, in distinct, sharp layers.

“It’s true ,” the man breathed in awe, his voice a clear match for the one I’d heard on TV. “The so-called vigilante is a queen ! Please, you must—”

Run . Something echoed within me, and I immediately turned and ran.

“Wait! We just want to talk!” Their leader called after me. “Damnit! Catch her and calm her down before someone else finds her!”

Shit. I reached up and pressed a button on my visor as I picked up the pace, and Zafir’s image fuzzed into view. I didn’t bother to let him say anything. “I need an extraction. Now .”

“An…” Zafir’s eyes widened as he listened, likely hearing the yelling Syldrari behind me. Then, he disappeared from the inside of my visor, but I could hear him typing rapidly. “Head toward the station at the head of the community you’re in—east from your current location. There’s enough ground clearance there for us to land a craft. Are they armed?”

“Unknown,” I stated.

“Did they threaten you?”

“No.”

“Strange… Do they know what you may be?”

“Yes.”

“Elara, I need you to calm down. You’re discharging,” Zafir spoke in a calming tone. “Keep running for the extraction point while you rein your nerves in. You might hurt yourself if you don’t stop sending currents of electricity everywhere.”

I did my best to do as instructed, but the looming presence behind me, though it wasn’t menacing, was not helping. Even when I skidded onto the main thoroughfare, the Syldrari ‘cult’ continued to follow me—but I saw my transport already descending from the skies.

I sensed someone preparing to attack, and so I pivoted and mustered my strength, envisioning a barrier forming between me and my pursuers. In an instant, a writhing mass of dark energy crackling with blue-white lightning emerged from the ground, leaning over the pursuers like a half-melted mass that was considering eating them.

Their confused shouts and warnings to each other bought me time to close the distance between me and the blacked out military craft.

I pulled myself onto the ledge…and felt a presence behind me as the waiting soldiers’ faces drained of color and they raised their rifles to aim behind me.

“Don’t let them change you.”

I looked over my shoulder to find the hooded Syldrari mere inches behind me, hands in the pockets of his coat, and an amused smile on his mouth. The human soldiers fired, but the bullets curved around the man and then stopped. He turned and looked at the hovering bullets before pulling his left hand out of his pocket. The ammo trembled, before turning liquid and flowing through the air to form a carved-looking sphere in his hand—which he then tossed into my transport as we flew away, without even looking where he was aiming.

“Don’t touch that,” I stated flatly, walking over to snatch the orb off the floor. “We’ll have the boss inspect it.”

“Ma’am…” a soldier nodded hesitantly, before sliding the door shut. Then, he called to the pilot, “Move out!”

What the fuck was that about? I turned the orb of metal over in my fingers, eyeing the wave-like patterns that curved around its surface. If I hadn’t seen what he’d done, I never would have guessed it was made from fired bullets.

“Fuckin’ bogey appeared outta nowhere…” one of the soldiers muttered in disbelief.

“Could’ve snatched her right off the damn ship before we saw he was there—why didn’t he?” Another asked, plopping down on a seat.

“You’re not more curious about how he deflected your shots?” I raised an eyebrow.

The soldiers present exchanged looks, then one spoke up, “Ma’am, that’s the norm when facing trained Syldrari. Sometimes we’ll get lucky and a single shot will get through, but that’s rare—and that it’s a shot that matters is even rarer.”

Then humans really are fucked when the Syldrari finally tire of their shit. I eyed the soldiers briefly, then looked at the metal orb again. Maybe stopping bullets was normal, but liquefying them without heat and turning them into a work of art? I doubted that was common.

When the ship landed on the roof of HQ, I barely took a single step off it before a worried Zafir filled my field of view. Poor bastard looked like he wanted to hug me, and like he was having a hard time not .

“Elara, are you alright?” Zafir asked worriedly as I started to walk past him. He looked to the soldiers and nodded to them briefly. “Thank you. I’ve arranged a nice dinner for you—speak with Erik when your shift is over.”

“We need to talk,” I stated, leading Zafir inside at a brisk pace, my suit melting away to reveal the shorts and a tank top I’d been wearing before I was called to duty.

“Then…” Zafir narrowed his eyes when he spotted the orb in my hand. “Understood. My office, then, and keep that out of sight.”

That, at least, was as simple as closing my fist around it.

Once we arrived on our floor, Zafir stopped in the kitchen to grab us both a bottled drink. In his office, he went through the process of disabling anything troublesome, then held out a hand to me expectantly. “Let me examine it while you brief me.”

I sat down with my drink and told him everything that had happened during the brief chase, and the very clear ‘show of power.’ The more I thought about it, the more curious I was as to why he hadn’t just snatched me right off the ship.

“You found no signs of the reported disturbance, either…” Zafir muttered, his eyes flicking rapidly over the surface of the sphere as he examined it. “We should operate under the assumption that they were specifically trying to draw you or your teammates out. They must have been looking for information, but…” Zafir’s mouth pulled into a frown as he turned the orb over again. “You said his coat had a tentacle motif?”

“Yeah.” I nodded.

“Then…are we dealing with Clan Drah-emh?” Zafir murmured, then shook his head to himself. “No, this behavior is inconsistent with them. Clan Kal’ild is in a different galaxy, and…”

Zafir continued to list off clans as he pulled up the footage from my visor cam on his data pad. He watched the brief encounter several times over, looking more and more confused by the moment.

“What is it?” I probed.

“None of them have clan imprints, which is highly inconsistent with known Abyss Father admirers.” Zafir glanced down at the orb again. “Controlling metal in such a way isn’t exactly a common talent and, setting aside the waves, the rest of the ‘carvings’ are consistent with clans that live in the deepest reaches of Syldra’s oceans.

“I will have to speak with our contacts to see if they recognize this work—or if they can think of someone who would be so cocky.”

“Cocky is the wrong word.” I grimaced at him. “That was the behavior of someone who knows every little thing he’s capable of, and he has utter confidence in his abilities. I’m here because he let me get away.”

“Yet you don’t believe he ‘just wanted to talk,’” Zafir pointed out.

“No. Something made my instincts scream to run away, so that’s what I did.” I sighed and took a sip of my drink, then looked over to Zafir again. “I can’t put my finger on it, but I don’t like how they immediately reacted to my presence and ‘knew.’ It’s a little unnerving when someone acts so clearly like they can see something I can’t.”

“See something you can’t…” Zafir echoed, his eyes widening. “ Clan Naylor-radyrr , or perhaps a descendant? If a descendant went rogue…perhaps there will be records…

“Elara, you’re off duty for the rest of the night. I want you to get some rest. If you can’t sleep, then see to the reading Rel or I gave you. If I discover something you can know—I’ll inform you immediately.”

“Well, that’s more promising than usual, at least,” I remarked, giving him an amused smile as I stood up. “Don’t stay up too late.”

“I… Thank you for your concern,” Zafir grumbled, the tips of his ears turning a little bluer. “Good night.”

“Good night.” I nodded and left him to the strange sphere and his studies.

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