“I assume you want me to decline,” Edward prompted, the ghost of a knowing smile playing at the corners of his mouth. He’d been with me long enough to read my expressions like a well-worn book. “What excuse shall I give this time?”
A laugh bubbled up from somewhere deep in my chest, escaping as an undignified snort. “Tell him I’m tied up meeting with aliens.”
The irony did not escape me. Aliens. And not just any extraterrestrials, but the Alliance Prime herself. The leader of what they called the Planetary Alliance, a confederation of worlds that made the United Nations look like a neighborhood watch committee.
Yes, aliens were real. Breathing, thinking, negotiating beings from beyond our atmosphere. Oddly enough, that revelation didn’t make the top five most shocking pieces of intelligence I received after inheriting the office. The classified files on Cold War-era operations alone read like something Tom Clancy would have rejected as too far-fetched. Covert experiments, psychological warfare, and technologies that defied conventional physics. The Illuminati were real, as was the Rosicrucian Order, and yes, I knew exactly who killed JFK—not who most people suspected.
I’d spoken with the Prime before, of course. Several times, in fact, through secure communication channels that made our most advanced technology look like tin cans connected by a string. The United States, along with a handful of European governments, maintained carefully negotiated trade agreements with the Alliance. We provided rare earth minerals and other natural resources they found valuable for reasons I only partially understood. In return, they offered technologicaladvances and medical breakthroughs. Cancer treatments that worked in days instead of months. Energy systems that could power entire cities without a single carbon emission.
The Prime had always conducted herself with a grace that bordered on regal, her communications marked by a formality that suggested centuries of diplomatic tradition. But this would be our first face-to-face meeting, and despite my best efforts to project confidence, anxiety gnawed at the edges of my composure like a persistent mouse.
Edward cleared his throat, one long finger tugging at his collar in that nervous gesture I’d come to recognize. “Madam President.”
I arched an eyebrow at him, letting my expression convey exactly what I thought of such stiff formality. We’d been through too much together for that.
He caught my look and sighed, his shoulders dropping slightly. “Ellie,” he began again, his voice softer now, almost hesitant. “I was just wondering if you wanted me to attend you during the meeting with the... aliens.”
Despite his extraordinary organizational skills as my Chief of Staff, Edward had the nervous disposition of a Victorian maiden encountering a spider.
“No, you can remain on Air Force One,” I said, fighting to keep the amusement from my voice as visible relief flooded his features.
I glanced across the narrow aisle where several of my Secret Service agents sat hunched over their phones, thumbs moving across the screens. Games, probably, or maybe checking in with families they saw too rarely. Normally, surrounded by this cocoon of highly trained protection, I felt as secure as a newborn swaddled in her mother’s arms.
But this meeting was different. I wasn’t nervous about the Alliance Prime herself, our previous conversations had beencordial, even pleasant. What sent my stomach into acrobatic loops was the question of why she requested this meeting at all.
When beings who could cross the vast emptiness between stars wanted to talk to you in person, it was a fair bet they didn’t want to talk about the weather.
Chapter 2
Rickon
I stepped off the shuttle onto the dusty tarmac, breathing in the crisp desert air that carried that distinctive electric hum of Earth's energy—a frequency I'd learned of during my previous visits. I felt drawn to it in ways I hadn't expected. As War Chief, Xabat should be the one standing here, but he was newly mated, so I'd volunteered to take his place.
Two dozen armed soldiers stood in formation around the shuttle, their weapons held at the ready, faces a mixture of wariness and poorly concealed awe. I almost snorted in amusement. No doubt they had expected aliens. But the six of us—myself, Cristox, Ixaka, Kariosak, Pavo, and Bieste—flanked the Prime protectively, each carrying a small cuddwisg device that projected a human appearance over our true forms. If Hewes was watching through whatever surveillance network he'd built, he would see nothing more than a delegation of unremarkable humans stepping off an ordinary aircraft.
Hewes. Just thinking his name made my jaw tighten with barely suppressed rage. He was a tech billionaire on the surface. One of those smooth-talking Earth males who'd built an empire on innovation and charm. But beneath that polished exterior lurked something far more sinister. A criminal mastermind with tendrils reaching into the darkest corners of both this worldand the stars beyond. Thanks to Xabat's younger brother, Xytol, we'd uncovered the full scope of Hewes's depravity. The bastard wasn't just connected to the human slave trade. He was one of its architects, orchestrating the trafficking of innocent beings across multiple star systems.
When Hewes kidnapped Xabat's mate Harper, we'd come close to capturing the bastard, but he’d had slipped through our grasp like smoke. Now he was hiding somewhere on Earth, concealed among billions of humans.
The Prime believed the American President would help us capture him. According to her, Earth's governments—particularly the American one—had as much reason to want Hewes brought to justice as we did. His crimes had victimized his own people, after all.
I remained skeptical of Earth's governments. In my experience, planetary leaders rarely acted purely out of altruism, especially when dealing with off-world affairs. But I trusted the Prime's judgment, even when my own instincts screamed out in warning.
The contingent of soldiers escorted us deeper into the sprawling complex of Area 51, our footsteps echoing through sterile corridors. When we entered one of the massive hangars, I stopped dead in my tracks.
There, suspended in a web of support scaffolding, hung a Trogvyk ship. I'd recognize the sleek, predatory design anywhere. The curved hull, the distinctive propulsion arrays. This was the vessel that crashed on Earth nearly a century ago, the incident that had changed everything.
Glass display cases lined the walls, each one containing fragments of Alliance technology. I spotted a Kelvorian navigation crystal, its inner light long since extinguished. A partially disassembled plasma regulator. The exposed circuitryof what looked like pieces of a communication relay labeled with human annotations.
Beside me, the Prime's golden gaze swept over the collection, and I caught the distinct shadow of regret that crossed her elegant features. The weight of responsibility sat heavily on her shoulders. I saw it in the tightness around her eyes, the way her jaw clenched almost imperceptibly. She had overseen the revelation of the Alliance to humans. Had been the one to allow humans insight into our technology.
She blamed herself for Declan Hewes. Or rather, for the man we now knew wasn't Declan at all.
His real name was Nigel Hewes, one of the human scientists recruited to study the Trogvyk ship after the crash in the 1940’s. Somehow, the cunning bastard had ingratiated himself with the Trogvyk, a slaver species not known for their trust or mercy. He'd learned from them, traded with them, and used them to bolster human slave trade.
Using a Garoot Healer—medical technology so advanced and rare that most Alliance members had never seen one—he'd kept himself healthy and young, playing the role of his own son and later his own grandson. Three generations of Hewes males, all the same monster wearing different masks.
His vast wealth, his reputation as an innovative genius, his empire of technology, none of it gained through his own brilliance. It was all stolen. Built on the bones of that crashed ship and the beings he'd helped enslave.
