She gives me a knowing look. “Alright, fine.”
I wait until Brynna is on her ship with the ramp sealed shut before I walk away. “DIA, can you keep tabs on her ship?”
“I have already been doing that.”
“Oh?”
“She is your fated. She is as much my responsibility as you are. Now, did you recognize the symbol on her forehead?”
I think back to it as I walk to my ship, where Fieri waits. “It was familiar, but I didn’t know it.”
DIA tells me what she chose and how important it is that I show the universe who I am.
When I walk up the ramp to my ship, Fieri is standing just inside, dressed in glossed black armor with an orange cragged stripe across the chest.
“Wow, look at you,” I remark. “Did DIA put you up to that?”
He snorts. “She insists I escort you because of what you are.”
“Fieri will not wear the cloak of a royal guard,” DIA counters from a nearby screen.
“It is a fighting hazard,” he retorts. “The enemy can take it and pull me around.”
“So now you know what it’s like to have wings in a Terran society instead of an airborne one,” I mutter.
He sighs and snatches a deep, blood-red cloak from a closet and clips it to his shoulders. “Better?”
“Better,” DIA and I say at the same time.
He wrinkles his nose. “Fucking hell.”
“If Cinuska could see you, she would be hatchanai,” I reply, opening up the cabinets holding uniforms meant for me when I grew up.
“Hatchanai?” Fieri asks.
“I am not sure they will fit,” DIA interrupts. “You grew more than expected. Cinuska fed you well.”
I laugh. “Are you calling me fat, DIA?”
“No. You are stronger than your mother and father’s genetics told us you would be.”
“Are they alive?” I ask, realizing I’ve never made the inquiry.
DIA is quiet for a long moment.
“DIA?”
“I don’t know,” she says. “Only entering the nebula will allow me to access our homeworld records. There may be no one left by now. I cannot say. You may be the last.”
“Why do you say that?” I ask.
“Populations dwindled because hope was lost every time we sent another messenger, and they never returned. It is why it is so important that you let the universe know you are still here.”
After a quick shower, I put on my ceremonial armor. It is smooth and black like Fieri’s, but bears an orange cloak that pins to my shoulders with radiant red clips shaped like the points of my tail.
“Is Brynna ready yet?” I ask.
“No. She cannot decide what to wear and has called for someone from the apparel department to help her.”
