2 Rowkin

Another week passes in a bloody shit storm. Our teams of rangers are finally home again, but not for a reason we like.

The Nebulous Empire's shadow soldiers rake up what my people have sown in the fields. They invade at night and raid our warehouses, taking the harvest. Our defense systems are not enough on their own against the empire. But we have been out here for weeks without a day's rest and fear we have been forgotten by our commanders.

But it doesn't matter; our duty remains the same. My brothers know it as much as I. This is our life.

Gunfire lances through the air as we run for cover. The few teams of shadow soldiers we fought last night have been replaced by an empire berserker that razes what's left of our fields and crews. We won't make it back to our transport. I know it as the enemy ship launches it skyward with a string of missiles. It blooms in a fiery white cloud.

Three more are dead. The pilot, copilot, and crew chief.

I watch the trails of fire cutting up the field. There is nothing left of the crops but scraps and scorch marks—and two of our own. They went down behind our teams as we took cover in the low hills.

"Our weapons just aren't enough!" Scrapper is the only human on our crew, a reject of his own society. But he's effective with a rifle for a human, and he's a coding pro, which comes in handy as our planet races to fortify its defense systems. "Fucking berserkers! We need a different tactic!"

I track the movement of the smoky ship as it follows another team. They stole from us. Now, they hunt us. Shadow soldiers are ruthless. They steal and kill, then leave planets and ports burning in their wake.

Four crews are left, including ours. The sky sears with the blazing cannons on the empire's ship.

"Two down," I call to Scrapper. "Looks like they're from Emans' crew. I'm going for them. Cover me?"

Scrapper raises his rifle but gives me a wild look. He's a pale-red white human with red hair and a beard few of my kind can grow. "Are you insane? That's a fucking bullet-sponge zone!"

Zoshun and Garsel are the only other team leaders left after last night's raid that took Emans from us. They slice through the stars, trying to take out the enemy ship with shots from the rocky hillsides around us. But nothing works against the Nebs smoky shields.

We are pieced-together teams from those left. We need help. But we also can't leave our brothers to die on the field.

It's twenty paces to them. Twenty very heavy paces back to cover. I'll be twice as slow to return.

Weeks ago, the federation told us that we have to wait for assistance. Other planets are under heavier attack. So we are on our own. I know if my brothers survive and heal, they will fight again. And we must preserve every soldier we can.

"Can you do it?" I growl at Scrapper as he fiddles with something he's frantically adding to his gun. He saves every useful part the rest of us would consider junk. And yet he always builds something new. I guess that's one of the benefits of being from Earth.

I was counting the days to my Abr slot until last month when the attacks increased. It's the only thing that's kept me going for the last year after my first feverish Rev. My desire to find a mate seems to be far stronger than the others on our crew. But I'm different than them. And I'm on fire inside. But I don't talk about it or my filing for Abr because it makes me feel like I'm abandoning my teammates for some silly nonsense.

I'm not going to go. It's okay. I can go another time.

But it eats at me. There isn't much that the empire hasn't taken from me.

"Yes, yes!" Scrapper rests his modified rifle atop a boulder and points it up at the ship in the sky. "Ready. But I have to be honest. I have no idea what this thing is going to do. I enhanced the outputs. Might blow the end of my gun off. No fucking clue!"

When the berserker rotates further toward Zoshun's crew, I charge out of the brush and rocks, down and back into the fields. Our teammates, Gnos and Treth, are some of the largest of our kind, easy targets, and difficult to haul off the field. But with the amount of training us RR class soldiers have, it's essential to save them and give them a chance. Few of us are left or are trained for what we have been.

It's too much of a challenge to hoist them both up, so I grab them each by their hands and drag them toward the tree line.

The empire ship turns back toward us. Blazing pulses punch into the ground in an arcing line that chews up the dirt in my direction. Each bullet smokes after it hits. "Scrapper!"

A blazing pulse rips out of his gun. It eats a hole in the empire's shield. Their fire cuts a line toward him.

"Shit!" Scrapper pelts out three more frantic shots. The ship stops firing, rises, and sends rockets roaring at him.

I drop the two I've dragged out of the field behind a boulder, sprint in his direction. The mere idea that I think I can outrun missiles is insane. But I am no ordinary Alustri. My skin shifts and hardens as I run into the line of fire.

Scrapper can't die. He's one of our best assets and my last remaining teammate. I snatch him up, and we tumble down a hill. The missiles warp the ground when they hit, sending heart-shaking pulse waves out as they pummel the hillside. Scrapper and I roll down and into a creek bed.

"Scrapper?" I scramble to his side.

He groans. Other than a few forming bruises, I see no serious damage. An ear bleeds, and he has an arm out of socket. But he nods.

The ship hovers over us, just visible through the canopy of maroon burwood trees.

"Come on." I encourage him up and grab him under his good arm when he struggles. Then I drag him inside a nearby tunnel. Shots cut through the ground as we slink back into the rock. Boulders disintegrate in plumes of gravel, eating their way into the cave.

I fear this may be our final battle.

Then everything stops and silence, except for the rain of dirt and sand, fills the cavern.

A distant rumble of empire engines is overlapped with the hum of others I can't place.

Blue flashes of light cut through the air in a blazing backlash.

"What the fuck?" Scrapper hugs his limp arm to his side.

We slink out of the tunnel to find a Nytheralian ship in glistening blues slicing up the berserker with surprising effectiveness.

The shadow soldiers squeeze off a few miscellaneous shots, but they soon back out of our airspace. Their hyperdrives illuminate, and the vessel launches out of orbit around our planet.

The Nytheralian ship hovers into the field and sets down.

"Better go see what they want in return." Scrapper grunts as he climbs the hillside.

As we crest the top of the ravine and descend into the field, I discover my sister, Lanika, carting one of the two I pulled under cover onto the Nytheralian ship. She has an arm wrapped up. Her dark hair is a tangled mess, and I fear what has happened to our kind.

"Go on, you big maroon bastard. I'll get there eventually." Scrapper waves me on as he stops to put his shoulder back in its socket.

"Lani—"

"He's hanging in there. IV and a booster if you could." She turns around after she's set Reecel, our prime sniper, on a bed.

"Rowkin." Lanika hugs me then braces and inspects my face. "They took the outpost. That's why no one came for your teams."

I return her affection and scan the others on the ship. "How did you end up with the lizard men?"

The commander of their vessel snorts at my remark. "We are not lizards , you leathery bastard. You're welcome."

Lanika sighs, and I know I've said too much. "This is Darsus of Nytheria. They brought us some weapons since the federation is assisting other planets."

Scrapper climbs the ramp beside us and sniffs the air. "You should not be in the field, Lanika."

She glowers at him. "I did not have a choice. Our family has been bred to be soldiers. And when Darsus requested a navigator, I volunteered."

A sensation I don't like creeps up on me, and I only half listen to their conversation. Someone calls to Darsus from deeper inside the ship.

Our other teams filter inside the ship, laying down their injured and dead. Zoshun gives me a sad look in passing as he and his remaining teammate hike in with two more bodies.

I am exhausted, but when I see them the tension of the monster inside surges again. It is not easy to move on when just the night before, our teammates hunted Nebs like the rest of us. My chest heats with the racing beat of my hearts.

"What is it?" Lanika leans back from me. "You're Revving, now? We've cleared the field."

My skin ripples and tightens in patches of armor. Something stalks us from the edge of the field. We are being watched. "Get everyone inside."

"But—" Lanika tries to protest, but Scrapper ushers her up the ramp and behind a wall.

I steal a rifle from a nearby bench and jump down from the ramp to skirt the trees. My monster wants out, wants vengeance—blood. The fact I have missed more than one mating Rev has me extra frustrated. I need release, and until I find her, I have to find it another way.