Chapter 12

Twelve

He didn't want to wake her, so he didn't.

Imber laid there with her draped across his chest, trying to keep his breathing slow and quiet so she wouldn't wake herself just because of the way he was breathing. He wanted her to sleep for as long as she needed.

She'd earned her rest. Even now, he could feel his cocks twitching at the memory. He would love nothing more than to wake her with a slow stroke between her legs, to see her eyes widen with desire and passion.

But he wasn't an animal, as much as his form suggested that he might be. He couldn't wake her up with expectations. Instead, he would allow her to continue to sleep because she trusted him. And this was enough for now.

Her hair laid across his shoulder, the silken feel of it so different from his own people's. Her tails on either side of his hips made him worry she might wake a bit uncomfortable. At some point during the night, she had straightened them. When he noticed they drifted a bit in the currents, every time she stirred a bit in her sleep, he'd wrapped his tail around her. Giving her a brace against the sea she wasn't yet used to.

Then she'd fallen into such a deep sleep, he almost felt as though he was breathing for her. Of course, he was, but he worried that she wouldn't be breathing at all if he hadn't been pushing air into her lungs with every deep breath of his own.

He just worried in general. She wasn't built to live in the ocean like he was, and there were many reasons for him to be afraid for her. It hadn't even been a full day yet since she'd been in the water, and already her fingertips were... wrong.

He was used to seeing them smooth like his own skin. But he'd lifted her hand to his lips just a few hours ago and noticed that her skin was waterlogged and wrinkly.

Wrong. It was wrong. He needed to ask her what was happening to her while she was in the water, and what they could do to stop it from happening.

A ripple of movement caught his attention above their heads. A shadow passing in front of the sun, a long tail and a sleek body that was designed for hunting. His sister. He would know Virago in any shape or form, at any distance.

Why would she be coming out here? Hadn't she been the one to tease him that he should take his mate and attend to her? Frowning, he closed his arms a little more tightly around his little achromos.

A low sound echoed through his chest, not quite loud enough to wake Alys but enough for his sister to hear. And she did. Quickly changing directions, his sister dove toward them. When she was closer, he could smell the fear drifting off her body in waves.

"What happened?" he asked, noting that her daughter was not attached to her hip.

"The achromos have come." Virago's eyes skated over Alys, curled up in his arms, and she hadn't even stirred yet. "You've made quick work of your mate, I see."

"Virago," he growled.

"We knew they were coming for our home, brother. We knew they were going to arrive sooner rather than later."

"Where is my niece?"

"Safe, with the others. We need to gather all the things that we can, and those who were too weak to do so have already moved. I tried to give you time with her, but there is no more time left." Virago's gills spread wide around her face and ribs, and he knew then that the situation was dire.

They weren't ever getting their home back. It was just like Alys said. Her people didn't care what they were doing to the ocean. This was the spot they had chosen, and they would destroy it.

Alys stirred against him, her tails squeezing tight as she slowly came awake. She took a deep breath, sucking all the air out of his lungs in what he thought might be a yawn before she blinked her eyes open and looked up at him.

She was so adorable. Tucked up against him, all soft and warm and completely unaware of what was happening. Her nightmares were so far away in the dreaming world, but she had no way of knowing they had chased her into the real world.

"Good morning," she said, her voice a little raspy with sleep and so quiet he almost didn't hear her.

"We have to wake, my wave song."

"No sleeping in today, hm?"

Virago's voice cut through their quiet conversation. "Your people have come to destroy ours, Alys of the achromos. I know this is not what you want to hear after the night you had with my brother, but you are able-bodied. If nothing, you can carry whatever we need."

He felt his hearts turn over in his chest as her eyes widened. With a sharp slap of her hands against his chest, she sat up. Her hair billowed in front of her face and she had to shove all the golden locks out of her way to glare at his sister. "What do you mean?"

He repeated the words to his sister. And Virago sighed. "I mean there are metal beasts clearing the ocean. They approach our home and we need all the help we can get to move out of their way."

Alys looked at him, then back at his sister. She spoke to him, but he had a feeling the words were for Virago as well, if his sister could have understood her. "I'm so sorry. I knew they were going to be coming, but I didn't know it would be this soon. I thought you all had more time."

He squeezed her thighs before unraveling their bodies. But he couldn't bring himself to let her go, and kept an arm around her waist as he swam them up to his sister. "There was nothing you could have done, Alys. Like you said, none of us could stop this."

His heart broke in the silence that followed. They swam through the currents and the waves, and he knew he was returning to what would be a very sad scene. His people had to flee from their homes. The places they had lived for years on end, even if they had only recently come back to these hunting grounds. He wasn't even sure where they would go now. But they would find somewhere they were welcome.

Alys, on the other hand, seemed to take all this to heart. He could feel her growing more and more angry. The scent of it filled his gills.

These were her people, and she was deeply unhappy with them. He wouldn't be surprised if her anger spilled onto others as well. There were a lot of people who were ready to be angry.

Now, all he could do was hope that he could control the situation.

It was no surprise that he couldn't.

The moment they all crested the rise that brought them to his home, he could see the metal demons in the distance. They weren't just scouting this time, they were destroying everything in their way. Countless of his people gathered whatever items they could. A few of them darted past, their arms already laden with food, tapestries, even a few of the stones to remember this place as it was before it was destroyed.

Virago stopped one of them, placing her hand on his arm. "Tell those who are already carrying things not to come back. We've run out of time."

The man nodded and then swam as quickly as he could to catch up with the small group that was already heading off.

"How are you going to find them all?" Alys asked, watching as they seemingly darted in countless directions. "No one is going to the same place."

"We always find each other." He didn't know how it was possible, but his people were good at coming back together. They would gather eventually. But for now, they all needed to get away from the metal demons in the distance.

His hearts squeezed as he looked at the billowing mass of dust and darkness behind the machines. They looked to be churning up the ground. Some of them were stuck at higher rises, but he could see they were eating away at the stone. Slowly digging themselves a flat plane. Anything in their way was destroyed. He could smell blood in the water, likely sea creatures who hadn't swum away from them fast enough.

"Brother," Virago said, her voice cutting through his horror. "We are needed."

"Of course."

He dragged Alys with him, although she hadn't said much yet. Then he dove into gathering whatever he could. He thrust everything he came in contact with into her arms. Tapestries, rugs, woven jewelry, whatever his hands found, he tossed to her.

"Whose are these?" she asked, looking down into the mass of items in her arms.

"I don't know," he muttered, looking around for more things to grab. "It doesn"t matter right now. Once we're all back together, we'll figure out who owns what."

"You act like you've done this before."

"We have," he absentmindedly replied, gathering things in his own arms now that he realized she couldn't carry more. "Sometimes it's natural disasters, other times your people get too close and we move again. We cannot take the risk of them finding out about us."

"But they already know you exist."

He froze as he remembered that. "Right. I need to tell the others about that so we don't get too close on our scouting." Arms full, he rotated, so she was above him. "Can you hold on to me?"

Her delicate hand wrapped around his shoulder and she held on as he swam them far away from those chomping machines that destroyed so much of his world. Imber felt a bit like he was leaving behind a version of himself that he might not get back. There was so much he didn't know. So much he wanted answers to. But this place would not be where he gathered those answers. Not when he had so many people to take care of.

They moved a long distance away until he could smell some of his people gathered just on the edge of a drop off that disappeared into the abyss. He joined them there, his hearts aching. They all gathered together, tails twined as they watched their home disappear in the distance.

He dropped his armful of things and then turned to help Alys empty her arms as well. "We'll wait here until we cannot any longer."

"Why are they just going to watch?" she asked. Her face was redder than he remembered. "You're all going to stay here and just watch your home get torn apart?"

"We mourn for what we lost," he replied. "We will watch it because it should not die on its own. Just as we stay with those we love when it is their time. Nothing should disappear alone. Not even the place that holds so many memories for us."

Her hands twisted in her skirts and suddenly she turned to him with a determined expression. "I don't know those droids, but I think I can figure them out. I can dismantle them. If you get me close enough, then I can figure out how to stop them. We can freeze them in their tracks."

Something in him cracked. He trailed the back of his hand down her cheek, loving her more than he ever had before. "They will just send more, Alys."

"Then we will keep shutting them down. It will be a graveyard of metal beats, I know, but you will still have your home."

"We do not wish to live in a graveyard."

"You have to do something!" she shouted, her voice carrying until all of his people stared at her. She turned to them, as though they would help her instead of him. "You can't just let them take your home. Not this easily. There are so many of you and those are just machines! I've seen Imber rip glass off my submarine. Surely there is something we can do."

He touched her shoulder, squeezing a little too hard. "Alys. We could fight until there are none of us left, but we have seen what your people are capable of. We know when we are outmatched."

She turned red rings eyes to him. "I cannot stand by and just let them do this."

"Breathe, little one. And let it go."

"It's my fight too," she snarled. "It's my fight because you are now my people. I can help. You have me now. It's not just your people who cannot fathom what mine have created. Those are just droids. They rely on wires and technology, which means there are parts of them that cannot be exposed to salt water. I can figure this out, Imber."

He wished it was that easy. He wished his people could return to a nest that had so much hardship but even now, looking at the destroyed landscape and all the black dust that already was at the edge of where they had lived and he knew... none of them would ever return to that haunted place.

"It's too late, Alys." He patted her shoulder a few times, trying to draw her back to this moment. "There are people here who need our help. We can help them. They are right in front of us, and we will not stop helping others simply because there is a fight that we may or may not win. Our home is lost. Now we look to the home we can build."

She let out a choked little sob. "I can't do that. I can't live with myself if I don't try, Imber."

Sighing, he let her spin away from him and lunge back to where they had come from. He could feel his hearts breaking, and the way his stomach rolled as she disconnected from him. No longer breathing for both of them, he took a deep breath into his lungs for the first time in a full day.

She had to feel it. She must have realized that she'd ripped herself free, and still she swam as though she could cross that distance without him.

Virago swam to his side, an amused expression on her face. "She's a feral little thing. What just happened?"

"She wants to go back and destroy her people's creations," he murmured. "She thinks she can stop them all."

"Then she is delusional as well as fierce. Sounds like someone I know." Virago slapped his back hard enough to rock him forward. "Go get your mate, brother. I'll gather the others while we can."

He swam after the short distance Alys had gone and then gathered her up in his arms. She slapped at him, even raked his skin with her tiny claws as she struggled to free herself. But by the time he'd connected them, forcing air through the tentacle and into her lungs, she'd lost all her fight.

Limp in his arms, he gathered her close to his hearts, pressed a kiss to her temple, and whispered into her hair, "It's gone, Alys. It's already gone."