Defiant (The Skyward Series Book 4)

I woke to a feeling of peace.

That didn’t make any kind of rational sense. I knew immediately where I was: in prison. I was a light sleeper, and at some point during the “night” had climbed up onto the bunk.

And yet a soothing calm radiated over me. It came from…

You, I thought to the unknown slug.

She fluted in my head. The communications slug I’d promised to save. As I lay there, feeling sorry for myself, she sent more comfort. Like a bandage on my soul.

How do you have time to comfort someone else? I thought to her. With your own situation as it is?

I could mostly frame the feelings and images she sent into a verbal response. I’m locked in a cage. I have nothing but time. And outward is the only place to look.

I sent back a sense of regret. That I wasn’t here to save her; that I hadn’t come willingly. But she’d already figured that out, from my emotions. I was a captive like she was.

Sorry, I sent again.

Wait. I was communicating with the taynix. Did that mean my powers were back? The drug had worn off? I quested outward, but felt nothing.

She replied. She was reaching out to me while doing her communications work for the space station. My drugs were still in effect; she was bearing the entire cytonic load of our discussion. She had a vague impression that my state would last around twelve hours.

You know the drugs? I sent her.

Yes. They were used on hyperslugs whenever they needed to be removed from their boxes. It was also the first step in a punishment process for a commslug—cutting them off from others.

Scud. If the drug was the first step of their punishments, where did it go after that?

I got back a sensation of darkness, pain, and silence.

Well, that was terrifying. If I ever needed to throw up again on command, I could simply remember the life these poor creatures were being forced to live.

Doomslug, I sent her. Can you find my friend? She’s here, somewhere.

The unknown slug, whom I named Comfort in my head, didn’t know Doomslug, but promised to see if she could find her. There were a lot of slugs here, but Comfort seemed confident that—with a little time—she could do it.

Great. But all of this just reinforced that I needed a way out. Not only for me and my friends, but for these creatures.

I climbed off the bunk and ate the ration bars left for me, did a series of push-ups and other exercises, then cleaned up as best I could. With a sink and the little bar of soap I’d been left, at least I could wash my jumpsuit.

Once the jumpsuit was dry, I put it back on, then cleaned my undergarments. It gave me something to do while I waited for the next injection. Sure enough, at what I pegged for midday, they opened the door. Cleaned and dressed, I raised my hands to try to forestall what happened next.

“I’ll be good,” I promised. “I won’t—”

A barrage of fire came through the doorway, stunning me and dropping me, drooling, to the ground. Scud. It didn’t hurt—at least not more than any other fall—but this could not be good for my body. I suffered the indignity of another injection, then just lay there. They didn’t even move me to the bunk, though they left another handful of ration bars. One joked about how bad the food was, and how I’d probably go crazy subsisting only on those bars.

Well, the joke was on him. I’d lived on rat meat and algae paste for most of my life. The ration bars were comparatively fantastic.

As I lay there, feeling miserable, Comfort reached out for me again. And oddly, I felt several others—a good five or six communication slugs doing the same. When I asked, Comfort said she’d talked to them about me, and asked for their help in finding my friend.

Their mental picture of me was amusing: a giant slug with long, squishy appendages. They saw me as one of them, just larger and oddly shaped. In context it was flattering, trust me. And only mildly nightmarish.

Any sign of Doomslug? I thought to them. And yes—one of the five had sensed a new slug arriving.

The Superiority didn’t understand the level of intelligence the taynix had. That was what happened when you treated living beings like mechanical parts—one was the same as another to them. So they’d just put Doomslug with the rest of their hyperslugs.

She couldn’t be contacted, though. It took me a few minutes of sorting through Comfort’s thoughts to figure out why. Apparently it was the boxes. Certain boxes could cut the slugs off from one another. But they were transferred often enough, fed and sometimes cleaned, so Comfort expected Doomslug would be contactable sometime in the next few days. She promised to send my friend feelings of support, as did the other five who were talking to me. All were on active communications duty.

This is how you survive, I thought to them. You do it together. Supporting each other.

They agreed softly, as they offered me that same support. I was awed by the scope of it. The idea of all these little creatures in cages, barely fed, beaten if they misbehaved…spending their days reaching out. Instead of looking inward, they’d created a network of support. Facilitated through the communications slugs.

It was a deeply powerful defiance that vibrated my soul.

I’ll help you, I sent to them. I’m going to find a way. Spread the word. Help is coming.

They believed me immediately, and began to flute with excitement. The question was, how did I make good on that promise?

Turned out, it was right there in front of me. I mean, not literally, since I was lying face down in a pool of my own spit. But you know. Metaphorically.

Can you reach out, I thought to the slugs, to my friends?

Immediate fear. Disobedience was severely punished. They felt fine contacting me, since they viewed me as “one of them.” The Superiority didn’t seem to know they did this, and didn’t have the resources to monitor it. But if any of them sent a message that far, to another planet, they risked alerting the Superiority’s guards. Signals sent out from the station were monitored carefully by machinery.

I understand, I thought to them as they shrank back from me in fear. Only, Comfort prodded at my mind tentatively. She wanted to know what she needed to do.

I managed to roll over and stare at the ceiling. It might not be a good idea, I thought to her. It could be dangerous.

She sent an image of me flying in combat, as I had during the data-breach mission. She’d been watching from afar.

Well, yes, I projected to her. I do dangerous things. But I’m a soldier.

I’m a soldier, she repeated back to me, and I could almost hear the fluting.

I supposed she was. Not by choice—but none of my people were soldiers by choice. Except maybe me, granted. I could have grown up in the most pacifist society in the Superiority, and I’d probably still be talking about beheading dandelions or something.

Okay, I sent back to her. I have friends in the military. Did you see any of them, when we were flying that mission?

Comfort wasn’t certain. She had trouble distinguishing humans from one another unless they were cytonic, as her kind sensed the world with their powers. All taynix—regardless of variety—could use cytonics to produce an image of their surroundings in their heads. Yet they recognized one another not by visuals, but through cytonic identifiers.

So I sent her an image, and a cytonic impression, of Jorgen. I’d talked to him on that mission. Did she know him?

Yes, she sent back, timid. She recognized that human. He was a giant slug too. I smiled at the image.

Can you reach out to him? I thought. Tell him where I am, and that I was taken against my will? That alone wouldn’t be enough to salvage this situation, but it would be a start. More, I wanted to see if I could get word out. From there, plans could be made. And perhaps we could find a way free of this mess.

Comfort sent me back a scared affirmative. Her captors didn’t always monitor communications perfectly, and she’d learned to piggyback on signals she sent. It was how she sometimes contacted slugs who were frightened and separated from the rest. She thought maybe, while on duty, she could do this type of spoofing—and send a double signal. One she was assigned to send, and a hidden one to Jorgen.

As I read her thoughts, I could feel the scars of a lifetime of abuse in her emotions, and it broke my heart anew. Scud, I’d thought my childhood had been hard, but I’d had the freedom to explore the caverns and a potential way to fight back against the Krell.

I hadn’t realized how dark it could get for someone without those options.

I try, Comfort sent.

Now? I asked.

On duty, she sent. Sending thoughts now. Good time.

With that, Comfort reached toward Jorgen, as I’d asked. I wished I could watch with my cytonic senses. Instead, the best I could do was feel her emotions, since she had deliberately extended them to me. I could feel her growing more confident as—I thought—she located Jorgen. A big slug who always kept himself clean, and complained when others got a little messy. Yup, that was him. I delighted in the idea of explaining—

Comfort went silent.

I tried to sit up, but I still couldn’t do more than wobble. I quested out for her, but my senses were blind. Why had she cut off from me? What was wrong? The other slugs didn’t reach out to me either; they’d hidden away. I finally managed to climb up onto my bunk, terrified for Comfort.

I lay there a long time, reaching for her, until the lock on my door clicked. I bolted upright, just in time to get shot with those stun guns yet again.

Scud, scud, SCUD.

This time, guards didn’t come to sneer at me. I was favored today, because Winzik himself strolled in, stone feet grinding on the metallic floor. As usual, the only clothing he wore was a sash across his exosuit’s body. He waved with his tiny crab claw, and the exosuit mimicked the motion, indicating that some guards should enter and prop me up against the wall in a semblance of a seated position.

Brade entered next and deposited a metal box on the floor. It was longer than it was tall, and maybe a little less than two feet across.

Winzik went down on one knee before me, then spoke in his soft, deliberate way. “They say I should keep you unconscious, human. We have drugs that could render you comatose. Unfortunately, I fear that the delvers would not recognize you—and the danger you present—in that state. They have difficulty telling the difference between us! My, my. They may mistake you for a log.”

I tried to growl at him, or spit at his feet, or do anything heroic. He’d left me unable.

“Besides,” he continued, “I feel that you can learn. All beings can learn, even humans. That is, in part, why I keep a trained one nearby. To remind people it’s possible to tame even the most abject of lesser species. With sufficient motivation. Applied correctly.”

He rested a hand on the box beside him, only centimeters from me. I heard, with horror, a panicked fluting inside.

No. He couldn’t. He…

Winzik held his hand out to Brade, who passed him a small mechanical device: a control pad, it seemed.

“At times,” he said, “one of our hyperdrive units or our communication units malfunctions. So we keep them in receptacles outfitted for easy disposal.”

I struggled. Trying to move. Trying to show the least bit of defiance. I threw every ounce of strength and passion into it, then I piled on the desperation and pain that followed.

I got nothing.

“Winzik,” Brade said from behind. “This might not be wise. We want her pliable. She’ll work with us, under the right circumstances.”

“Of course she will, Brade,” he said. “My, my. You seem to be regressing. Because these are the circumstances where she’ll work with us. Once she is motivated.” He leaned forward. “You might call this aggressive. That is why you are of lesser intelligence. You do not yet see: It is not aggressive if it is done without malice. If it is done, instead, with regret. I regret what you have done. I regret that you are foolish. I regret that you have killed this frightened creature.”

I could hear Comfort fluting inside. More and more panicked. As if she knew. As if she understood.

My emotions mounted to a frenzy. I managed to combine them into a single vengeful burst of energy. Like a spear punching through armor.

It amounted to two words.

“Please. No.”

Winzik hesitated, then leaned even closer. He waved with a claw, gesturing a soldier forward to level his gun at me.

Then, satisfied, Winzik leaned back. “The tool in this box,” he said, “is corrupted. See that you don’t corrupt any others.”

He pushed a button on his pad.

The box flashed and rattled briefly, light leaking from the seams. A violent red light, like something from the forges. Smoke followed, with a terrible scent of burned flesh. And one final impression.

Save my friends.

After that, there was no more fluting.

My heart broke. I couldn’t move, but somehow I could cry. The tears running down my face seemed to please Winzik. He stood up, waving his hands animatedly.

“We can remove any of them that malfunction,” he said. “At any time. Remotely, if we wish. Please remember this before you seek to use them again. Brade warned me this might happen. We were therefore watching when this unit sent two signals instead of one.”

I managed to force out two more words, somehow.

“Kill. You.”

“My, my. There is such emotion in the lesser species.”

With that, he turned and left. Brade and the guards followed, then the door slammed. Locking me in alone with my agony, shame, and seething hatred.