30. CHAPTER 30

The ship purred to life, and the doors opened with a swish, exposing the soft white interior of the ship.

"There, the doors are open," Connor said, almost smugly. Like he had to show me that he was capable of bypassing our ship"s security. Come to think of it, the machine had spoken my language perfectly and understood me from the beginning, and I hadn"t even thought of it!

I entered the ship. There was too much to digest at the moment to stand around gawking at the damn thing, though I would keep that piece of information stored in my memory.

The inside looked clean and polished, not at all like it had been sitting here getting juiced for four years. It looked more like a passenger ship. The small bar still had alcohol in its oval-shaped glass decanters. I picked up one, swirled the greenish liquid around, removed the top, and gave it a long whiff, taking in the herbal and fruity notes. Ah yes. Xhuel Wine, a Valisian favorite, aged to perfection long before it was ever poured into the glass. I grabbed one of the fluted wine glasses from the stack, poured myself a drink, and without hesitation, I swallowed the sweet liquid. Still good, naturally!

Whoever owned this ship sure as hell had good taste. Now look at me, wanting to get to the bottom of this mysterious ship that attacked the human"s AI, but now I was thinking of taking another drink. Oh, what the hell. I took another drink.

The sweet flavor delighted my tongue, and the heat washed over me.

"I can tell by the height this is a Valisian ship, but it is something I"ve never seen," I said to the others who were off exploring the ship. I noted that the weapons systems weren"t very extravagant, but enough to do the job. We Valisians rarely traveled in ships that weren"t armed to the teeth.

"It"s beautiful," Caspian gasped, his eyes lighting up since we came here.

"Yes, it is," I agreed with him: the soft, clean seats and overall sleek design. Someone built the ship for comfort, and while even my new ship had its comfortable cabin it was still very much a warlike vessel. I couldn"t remember the last time I flew around in a passenger ship. "But we need to find out who owned this ship. The database looks dated," I said, taking a seat at the helm beside Connor, who was already in the ship"s systems.

"It"s dated 950 sd."

"That"s over two hundred years ago! And this ship attacked you only four years ago?"

"That is correct." Connor nodded.

"I"m not even picking up the name of its owner; it"s like the data had been scrubbed." The owner was smart; they didn"t want the ship traced back to them, but why? Did they have time to attack an alien ship and scrub their own system?

"Lorvian! You might want to get in here," Caspian yelled for me in the back of the ship. I wasted no time reaching his side. He stood in the distant hallway in front of an opened door. He backed away, allowing us to see inside.

Blood. Black Valisian blood coated the large bed and floor, and someone left a handprint on the wall along with a shoe print on the white carpet. On the floor was a bloody white lace dress.

"Two males, one was an omega," I said, stepping into the room. The blood had long since dried. "There are two sets of footprints," I noted the sizes and possible fingerprints etched on the walls.

"So they were injured before attacking the Connor"s ship?" Capsian shook his head trying to make sense of it. "Maybe they needed to ditch this ship for some reason….can Valisians survive FTL travel with no food and water?"

"We can. But all of this blood? They would be unconscious long before getting anywhere."

"Then maybe it isn"t as sinister as it seems. Could our droids have attacked them first?"

"Connor?"

"We did not attack them," he replied, knowing what I would ask. "We scrubbed our ship clean after taking all the DNA samples we could."

"Tell us the whole story of the attack on your vessel."

"I was working in engineering when the ship came upon us and attacked using stealth technology. I began repairs while two of our teammates reported entering the pods to return to Earth after our FTL communicator failed. Others reported two alien hostiles. The larger male tried to take over the bridge. However, to make the ship run more efficiently, the bridge was manned by pure AI in the systems. It was unfit for organics. It didn"t take him long to realize we were all AI. He ceased his attack, carried the severely injured smaller male to the escape pod, and forced the doors open before takeoff. That was the last we"ve seen or heard of them. We proceeded on course to the colony to transport supplies. We contacted Earth, yet we received no word. We continued with our main objective to complete the colony."

"My fucking head hurts," I said, beginning not to care anymore.

"Oh," Connor spoke again. "The male hummed a tune to the smaller one." Connor mimicked the tune.

"That sounds familiar," I said. "It"s an old Valisian tune typically sung to babies. My Damma used to sing it to me, it"s quite common and tells us nothing."

"Connor, keep this place sealed and allow no one else permission to enter but those you trust, perhaps others like you. And I want tests done on the blood and those fingerprints recorded before we leave."

"Sir." There goes that damned salute again.

"We won"t sort this out right now. Let"s focus on preparations for leaving this place."

"You don"t have to tell me twice," Cormac said, already leaving the ship.

Grabbing the wine from the small bar, I escorted Caspian out, leaving Connor to get to work.

There was one more thing I needed to do: talk to my not-so-loyal companion, Tavi, who was now sitting behind bars on the colony.

She stood when we entered the cell. I was half expecting Daruuk to be prowling the building demanding her freedom, but perhaps he realized how ridiculous it would make him look.

"I see my brother is walking free," she said, approaching the bars. "I"m sure his negotiation skills were just too irresistible," she mocked.

"Why did you lie about Swarti attacking you?" I asked although the answer seemed obvious.

"I knew there was tension between you," she chuckled. "What do they say? The recipe for the perfect lie is a sprinkle of truth?" She tried to gesture, only to be reminded of the cuffs around her wrists. I just needed to get on your smaller ship and I knew you would never take me if I asked. Besides, I gave you a big hint as to what he was."

"And so, you"ve finally revealed yourself."

"Is this the part where you save face by telling me you knew all along?"

"No, I didn"t know. I thought the fight was out of you."

"Well surprise, it isn"t!"

"Why do you want to be Queen? It was the ruling council who raped you, I don"t imagine you would want to work with them after that, and becoming Queen under the hegemony would mean you would have to work with them. You"re better off leaving our puppet Queen alone."

"So you never had any intent to hand our world back to my brother."

I laughed. "I would, we rule over too many places as is. But I have no desire to deal with a Queen who only wishes to settle grudges with her family over the fact that they couldn"t help you."

Now, her face changed. That smirk she had plastered on her face turned into rage. "No! They did nothing! Big difference! As long as they could maintain their power, they were happy to give me up to keep those worms!"

"As I recalled, the royal family had raped the wives and daughters of their advisors and staff, and they had done so for years. You knew about it. Some of those girls were your palace playmates whom you fed to your insatiable family whenever they displeased you. When the riots against your family began, and the officials formed the ruling council, the royal family began to take the demands of the people seriously, and as a bonus, they allowed the council the use of their virginal princess—"

"Shut up!" Tavi screamed. "You"re like all the others! You think what they did to me was right!"

"No." I shook my head. "I understand their lust for vengeance. They became only what your family taught them to be. And you were not an innocent bystander. But you were still a child, and like the ruling council, your family taught you to be what you are."

"I don"t want to hear anymore." She retreated against the walls away from me.

"So, what is it? You want them all gone. You want to rule as Queen, maybe have your brother killed?"

"Well, don"t you know me well?" she scoffed. "I know it"s a cliché at this point, but I would be a better ruler. My brother only understands violence." She calmed down. "I will continue to offer our most comely people to you and your people, of their own free will, of course. My brother would deny you even that. And you saw how easily his own people would betray him for me."

So now she bargained, and it was just what I wanted. I would be a fool to rely solely on Daruuk when I had another wannabe ruler who was more accommodating. That"s why I kept her close. The only difference is that I know what I can expect from Daruuk. Tavi was a different matter.

"Well, that is a tempting offer," I said, enjoying this. "Who says this human venture would pay out? If you had proposed this sooner instead of trying to steal my ship, I would have been inclined to pick you over him."

"Maybe I was just keeping you on your toes and demonstrating my power."

"I"ll make sure you"re released and treated well. As a show of good faith. I will let you know my decision soon, but you will not have access to my ship." If she ran off again, so be it. It wouldn"t be on my ship.

We left the cells and returned to fresh air, and I could hear our ship starting up.

"Good, can"t wait to leave," Caspian sighed, looking as tired as he sounded.

"You"re in a rush."

"Yeah," he scoffed. "I wanted to come here so damn bad. But I don"t belong here. I felt more comfortable onboard that ship with you, Cormac, and Connor than anywhere else."

I understood how he felt, but I couldn"t predict what dangers would await us back home. Taking a chance like this wasn"t in the cards. At least here he had Swarti and my soldiers, who I knew were loyal to me or the idea of me and would not betray me for my siblings.

"I can"t take you with me. I will have an envoy here who will care for you while I"m gone. Just stay out of the human"s way and wear your hood."

"I can"t believe this!" He shouted in anger.

"Caspian, it"s too—"

He didn"t want to hear it. He walked away toward the small living space he had claimed as his own.