The Cook's Game (Warriors Book 2), page 13
‘There is one more thing,’ Thanesh said. The smile disappeared, and his face became serious. ‘Garen is going on another mission.’
‘Another one. He just got back. Where is he going?’ Concern for his son rose.
‘He’s going into Iladar space to find the location of the human males.’
‘Vrok! Thanesh, if they catch him—’
‘I know. I tried to remove him, but he insisted. Keral, something is very wrong. He’s never been this reckless in a hundred solars of life. He refuses to come to our home when Dairon is on-world. If he sees him, he leaves. Dairon won’t talk about it but—’
‘You think they’re prebonds?’
Thanesh nodded. ‘So does Alethia. She says she recognises the signs from her mother’s Kuyon mates.’
‘Vrok.’ Keral had suspected it for a while. Hoped for it for longer. Dairon was already like a son to him; he loved the idea of Garen and Dairon forming a prebond while they waited for the third of their triad, but Garen had sworn there was nothing there.
‘I’ll call him now. Thank you, Thanesh.’
‘You are most welcome, my friend.’
As the screen went dark, Keral was already punching in the code for his son’s comm.
The bed was cold without Keral. Addison stretched across and felt the cold space where his heat and flesh should have been. Opening her eyes, she looked around the dimmed room and found there was no sign of him.
Climbing out of bed, Addison wrapped the oversized blanket around her and walked out through the lounge and into the facility proper.
Raised voices were coming from the ops room. Creeping forward, Addison saw Keral, his back to her, talking to someone on the screen.
‘It’s none of your business,’ a male voice said. Addison crept closer and saw a male with pale blue skin, black on black eyes and blue hair. For a moment, she thought she was looking at Dairon Ethallion, but then she noticed the horns, antelope-like, on his head.
‘Garen, you’ve been running into every danger you can be assigned to for almost five solars. Around the time you met Dairon. Just tell me! He’s your prebond, isn’t he?’
The face of the blue male went hard. ‘Yes.’ he bit out.
Keral shook his head. ‘I don’t understand. That should be a joyous thing. You’ve met one of your mates—’
‘I will not talk about this further,’ the male snapped.
There was silence for a few moments. Addison could see the lines of tension in Keral’s body. ‘It’s because of your mother, isn’t it?’
The male looked away. Even from this distance and through the small screen, she could see an ancient pain etched into his features.
Addison took a step back, feeling like an intruder.
‘I must go. We’ll be crossing into Iladar space soon.’
‘Garen… you know I just want you to be happy, safe?’
There was silence for a moment. ‘I know.’
Keral let out a breath. ‘I love you, my boy.’
‘I love you too, Father.’
The light from the room diminished. Addison heard a long and pained sigh coming from Keral. Part of her wanted to go to him, comfort him. Another part wanted to leave him his privacy. He’d tell her in his own time.
‘Addison?’
Sighing, Addison walked around the corner. ‘I’m sorry. You were gone. I came to see where you were.’
Keral turned to her. There were shadows under his eyes, and though he smiled at her, it didn’t touch his eyes. ‘You have nothing to be sorry for.’ He walked over to her and pulled her into his arms, and Addison felt herself sink into the warmth of him.
‘Is he okay?’
‘How much did you hear?’
‘Something about prebond, and he’s going on a dangerous mission.’ Addison looked up at Keral. ‘You don’t have to tell me.’
Keral’s smile was gentle. He stroked her face with the back of his fingers. ‘You’ve heard of the half-Kuyon that visits your world, right?’
‘Dairon Ethallion. I thought that was him for a moment. But his skin is paler.’
‘Garen is half-Kuyon, like Dairon. Ever since they met, he’s avoided him. Gone on one dangerous mission after another.’ Keral grimaced. ‘When he was eight solars old, his mother, my lover, met her prebonds.’
‘Prebonds?’
‘Before a Kuyon triad is formed in the first mating, they’re prebonded. They know they’re bondmates, and sections of the bond fall into place when they mate, but until all three of them are together, the bond doesn’t truly form. Carai and I always knew it was temporary. We didn’t love each other, but we had fun and enjoyed each other’s company. Garen was a surprise. A blessing. There were only five other hybrid children back then. We loved him. For a long time, it was him that kept us together. But as soon as Carai met her prebonds, it was like Garen ceased to exist for her. Even her prebonds were shocked by how easy it was for her to walk away from him. He never forgave her for that or them for allowing her. He’s denied his heritage ever since.’
‘So finding his prebond is a bit a nightmare for him?’ The image of the half-Kuyon, half-Tessan jumped into her mind, along with the vids she’d seen of Dairon. Her heart ached for both of them. It had to be hard for Garen to deny himself like that and for Dairon, who always greeted the cameras and his fans with a cheeky grin and jokes.
‘Seems so.’ Keral sighed again. ‘He can’t deny it forever, but my greatest fear is he’ll get himself killed rather than give in to it.’
Addison wrapped her arms around Keral’s chest. Her arms were long, but they were nowhere close to reaching each other. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Me too, dycalti.’ He sighed again.
As they stood there, Addison felt Keral relax in her arms. ‘Is there anything I can do?’
‘Yes. You can help me forget by letting me lick that pretty little cunt of yours.’ With that, Keral picked her up and carried her back to bed.
Several hours later, the alien version of jerk chicken was finally served. Keral listened to Addison describe the differences between the meal she’d intended on cooking and this one. To Keral, it was delicious and much spicier than he imagined a human was tolerant of.
Keral listened quietly, enjoying the gentle cadence of her voice. Addison spoke only when she had something to say, so listening to her now seemed like a treat. She went from talking about the recipe in front of them to cooking the meal in her apartment in the space station where she lived, to things she’d enjoyed watching as she ate, to spending time with her aunt without any space between. This was how Addison’s brain worked, he realised. Intuitive leaps from subject to subject. In her mind, the connections were clear, and it was up to Keral to keep up.
He was going to get her out of here. The thought burned through him with fierce determination. His only regret was that he couldn’t get the information about the other humans from the slavers while he was here. A sigh slipped from Keral’s lips.
‘What’s wrong?’ Addison had stopped talking immediately and was watching him, the skin between her brows pinched.
‘Nothing,’ he said.
The look Addison gave him was sceptical. Keral nodded. If the female chose him, she would be his mate. He should start sharing everything with her now. ‘Part of my mission here was to get information from the market about where the humans were sold.’ Keral looked up at her. ‘I failed.’
Something sparked in Addison’s eyes. ‘Wait here.’ Addison ran from the room and returned a few moments later, dropping something into Keral’s hands.
‘What’s this?’
‘It’s footage and logs of every member of Endurance who passed through the station. Where they were sold, who too, what ships they were shipped out on. Crew manifests, passenger logs. Everything I could gather.’
Keral’s mouth opened in shock. He looked down at the chip. This was more information than he’d ever considered he could get.
‘I couldn’t watch my crew be sold and do nothing,’ Addison said. ‘Especially when I had that system at my disposal.’
Keral shook his head and stood, dragging the tiny human into his arms. ‘You truly are a unique and incredible female,’ he whispered, before kissing her on the head. He held her there for a few sicri before they sat down again. Keral slipped the chip into his pocket.
His conversation with Thanesh the night before replayed in his mind. Across from him, Addison was pulling strips of meat from the leg and nibbling on it.
‘Tell me again how you found the door to the tunnels.’
Addison was taking a bite as he spoke, and he waited patiently as she chewed and swallowed. ‘Erm, it looked obvious to me.’ Addison shrugged. ‘Andelos was bringing me to his apartment. We were near the entrance to the bazaar, and he was talking to some contact of his. There was no one else around. I moved away from him a little, and he spotted me, but he thought there was nowhere I could go, and he’d already explained to me what would happen if I ran away on the station. The things the aliens would do to me if they caught me.’ She shivered. ‘I was looking at the panels, and there was just one that was different. I couldn’t tell you why, but it was. I went over to it, and there was this mark. I touched it, and it depressed, just ever so slightly. I looked at Andelos, and he and the other guy had their backs to me, so I pressed it into the wall, and the whole panel popped open. Andelos still hadn’t noticed, so I stepped inside and shut it.’
‘And then?’
Addison grinned. ‘I watched him on the screen on the door. It took him another minute to realise I was gone. He freaked out and went off looking for me.’ Addison’s shoulders rocked as she giggled. ‘I waited for a bit. I couldn’t quite believe I’d gotten away, but even though he came back a few times, he never figured out where I went. After that, I explored.’
‘So there’s an entrance near to the bazaar?’ Keral asked.
Addison nodded.
‘Anything closer?’
Addison shook her head. ‘No. The station becomes more open plan at that point. The walls are all movable, so they can change the configuration of the docks and the shops around them however they want.’
Keral nodded his understanding, a thoughtful expression on his face. ‘I’m not going to be able to get back to my ship now without violence,’ Keral said. ‘We can’t try to repeat the hauler plan. I can’t guarantee getting you off that way, especially since Galdranis now knows I had help escaping.’
When Keral looked up at Addison, there was a look of relief on her face. He knew she wasn’t a fan of the plan, but it seemed she’d really worried about it. ‘Any ideas.’
Addison stared at him in surprise for a few moments, her wide eyes suddenly wider. ‘Actually, yes.’
Keral loaded his fork up with the red grain, signalling her to continue before taking a bite.
Addison put down her utensils. There was a hesitance to her, but determination quickly pushed it aside. ‘Okay. I’ve been kind of thinking about this like a game, ever since I got here. How would I escape if I had the skills to fly a spaceship.’
Keral nodded, watching a small knot of skin form between her brows as she went through her plan in her mind.
‘We rewire the system to take back lock control, it should only take a day or two, but it means we lose the cameras. I think it’s a sacrifice worth making.’ Addison looked at him as though waiting for him to cut her off, protest. Instead, he nodded encouragingly. ‘Erm, we wait until the middle of the night and lock down the whole station.’ Again, she waited. Keral took another bite of food. ‘Then we exit the tunnels where I entered, right next to the entrance to the bazaar. You’re on point for defence while I use the door chips to access doors and lift controls.’ She turned in her seat; enthusiasm had animated her now, making her body almost vibrate with energy. ‘Then, while you’re flying us out of there, I can set up a direct rig to access the airlock controls. We can make that down here easy, but you’re going to have to talk me through it when we’re on your ship. With that in place, we should be able to take control of the inner and outer airlock.’
Keral stared at her as he ran the plan through in his head. ‘I like it,’ he said. ‘We’ll need to talk it through some more. Make sure we both know what our jobs are. Use the cameras to refine it, then we’ll take them offline and start reworking the system.’
‘You really like it?’ Addison was beaming now.
‘I do. It’s a good plan, Addison. Simple but crafty. Use what we have. Whoever Korren sends down here will have to completely rerig the system, but that’s their problem. I hear you used to play some sort of game on Earth?’
‘Oh, Wargames isn’t just a game. Earthgov uses it to practice for alien invasions. It’s a totally immersive experience where you can work your way up in ranks, make builds for ships, engines, weapons, stations, fighters. Create offensive and defensive strategies. It’s incredible.’ Addison drew her feet up on her seat, her toes curled around the edge, while she sat, her knees up against her chest, her arms hugging them. ‘We have a saying on Earth that Generals are always fighting the last war. But we’re up against aliens. We have no idea how they might think or what their plans are or what extremes their bodies are capable of taking in battle.’ Addison wasn’t looking at him now; instead, her eyes were fixed on the wall behind him, unfocused. She rested her chin on one knee.
‘We had to plan. Initially, when Earthgov released it, the players fought the last three invasion attempts over and over again. They were strategising how to win them, but we’d already won them. Then they noticed that the players were using their own strategies. Someone released a build so that they could start refining engine designs. Then a load of new builds appeared, allowing people to redesign things. Some of them were amazing, but some were really awful, so Earthgov took control of the builds by hiring players to create and manage them. Then they realised they could take the most strategic people from the game and hire them to create new invasions.’ Addison snapped out of whatever images her mind was weaving and looked at him once more. ‘Some play as alien invaders, and the rules are slightly different for each race based on what we know of aliens. So they’re able to do things that, for humans, defy the laws of physics and biology. We fight on both sides, and this way, Earth has strategies that go far beyond any real-world war we’ve ever fought.’
Keral stared at Addison, his mind buzzing with what she’d said. There was some of it he simply didn’t understand, but for the first time when he looked at her, he realised he was looking at someone with Thanesh levels of intelligence.
‘Earth is inventive,’ he said weakly. He cleared his throat. ‘Thanesh says that Sophia describes you as a “bit of a legend”.’
Addison laughed. ‘That sounds like Sophia.’
It was one of the few times Addison had ever allowed herself a genuine belly laugh in front of him, and Keral drank it in. He vowed, if she accepted him, he would give her plenty of things to laugh about every day in their life together.
‘So the game is broken into different aspects. Different wars. In one, I’m a general on one of the big warships. I strategise big battles, though my forte is tricking the enemy into making the first move. I’m an engineer in three other aspects. One on another battleship. One on Mare Imbrium on the lunar base where the fighter jets are designed, and I work on a Sentinel station working as part of a team to refine the design of the automated stations.’ Addison shrugged her shoulders like all of this was no big deal. ‘We do it all on our own time, but for a few, Earth either employs them or, like me, I’m an independent contractor. I get a kickback for every design or strategy they use.’ Addison yawned and stretched, her feet finding the floor once more. ‘In the last one, I’m a fighter pilot. That’s how I know Sophia. Part of her training, before her academy squad was allowed in a real fighter, was in the game with those of us who were experienced. Honestly, the only time I’m not in the game is when I’m eating or sleeping. I’ve been playing since I was thirteen years old, and I’m twenty-seven, so I’ve logged,’ she looked around the room while her lips continued moving, even as she made no sound, ‘tens of thousands of hours in that game.’
‘I thought you were a cook on Endurance?’
Addison nodded. ‘Yeah. I’m neurodivergent. We aren’t allowed to join the military or have any position of stress within the Earth defensive machine.’ Addison shunted forward in her seat. ‘But that’s almost every industry on or around Earth now. It limits us to second-class citizens and low-level workers. The game is the only place I was ever afforded respect.’
Keral shook his head, furious at Earth and their lack of insight. Addison could have been their Thanesh, could have—no, should have been one of the people to lead them, but because of this thing, they refused to see her for what she really was. Keral reached out, wrapping his long fingers around one of Addison’s small hands. ‘Well, when you get us out of here alive, you’ll show them just what you’re capable of. Not that I’m letting you ever go back to Earth. You’re mine now, dycalti.’
Addison was once again cross-legged, sitting on the floor and marking out a new system, even as she looked at all of the pieces of the ops system sitting between them.
Keral stood in the door, watching her. He couldn’t seem to stop himself from watching her anymore. Everything about the little human fascinated him, from her long, dreadlocked hair, which she’d spent the morning plaiting into intricate braids after getting frustrated about missing parts, to her bare legs, crossed over each other, her toes twitching to some internal rhythm as she sketched out the new interior for the computer.
Keral reached up to his own hair, which Addison had taken to braiding when she was finished with her own. They’d talked through the issue and agreed to remove the memory cores from one of the backup systems and cannibalise the parts to make up for what they were missing. Done and happy, Addison helped Keral take the backup apart and was sat working on the extra pieces while he cooked their evening meal.
