Kinyi strode past Tane and out of his office. She hated that he might smell the fear spiking through her blood. War could have come to Kladuu, and she was here, on Earth, doing nothing. She’d reached the street before he caught up with her.

He grabbed her arm and jerked her to stop. “For fuck’s sake, slow down. Where are you going?”

The evening made the street even darker than normal beneath the gleaming spires of the upper city. The streetlamps buzzed loudly and flickered with surges of impotent electricity. The puddle Kinyi stood in reeked of rotten meat.

“To my ship. I have to get a comm to Zayd. They might need me.”

Tane frowned. “You have a ship?”

Kinyi rolled her eyes. “What is it about men that when their cocks get hard they can’t think with their actual brains?” She waved a hand down at his still very hard—very impressively hard—cock. “Yes, I have a ship. How do you think I got here?”

He adjusted his pants, and his narrowed eyes promised violence. Around his violet irises were flecks of silver, like tiny bits of moonstone.

“Let me get this straight. You brought an alien ship to Earth? To Cyn City, no less. The city with the highest crime rate in all of the American Corporation?”

“I’m not stupid. I hid it.” She hadn’t actually thought that part through when Gerrit had loaned Zayd a Vilkan ship that could be preprogramed with the route to Earth. She had no clue how to fly the thing, but she hadn’t had to lift a finger until she landed on Earth and needed to open the hatch.

“Let’s hope you hid it well. For your sake.”

“It’s underwater,” Kinyi snapped. “No one will find it.”

Tane’s eyebrows shot up. For a second, she thought he was impressed with her cleverness, but then he smirked and her heart sank. “You do know the water recedes and rises, right? Depending on how much water the Deluge moves to generate electricity?”

Kinyi cursed under her breath. She whirled around and forced herself not to sprint down the street. The neon lights flickered across the puddles, which shone with oil-slick rainbows before she plowed through them, the heels of her boots spraying water around her.

Tane ran up beside her, still laughing.

“You can fuck off, now,” she muttered.

“Oh, no. I want to see this, and as we walk, you can explain to me how the humans’ commander got involved with Kladuu.”

“Gideon,” Kinyi growled, her skin prickling.

As they walked and Kinyi explained Commander Gideon’s role in the fight on Kladuu, the streets began to fill with people getting off work. Mostly cyborgs coming from the Deluge. Vendors started hawking their wares, their calls punctuating the dark like stars. High overhead, trams zipped by with a thunderous racket. Kinyi made a few more turns until they were on the outskirts of the city, beneath the shadow of the Deluge.

“And he’s on Kladuu?” Tane asked after she had finished explaining.

“Somewhere. Or Maxsym kidnapped him just like the reports said. That sounds like something that idiot would do.”

In the swamp zone, the grass grew high in brambles full of thorns and reptiles. The marsh leading to the base of the towering wall looked identical to when Kinyi had landed here weeks ago. The swamp had been appealing because it was far enough away from the city for the ship to not be stumbled across.

A sigh of relief escaped Kinyi when she saw the marsh was exactly as she’d left it. “See?” She turned to Tane. “It’s fine—”

A peal of laughter sounded from deeper in the marsh. She spun toward the sound and saw flashlight beams arc through the darkness before going out. Metal squealed in complaint.

Her metal. Her ship.

“Raiders,” Tane said. She heard the grin in his voice. “Should have known better.”

“Motherfuckers!” Kinyi shouted.

She raced across the marsh, her boots sinking deep into the thick, murky waters. Within seconds, she was soaked through and shivering, growling and spitting with every step.

“Leave my ship alone, assholes!” she yelled.

The laughter stopped. She stumbled onto a patch of dry land and leaped over a stack of old tires and oil barrels leaking sludge into the ground. One dead tree stuck out ahead like a skeletal hand. She’d parked her ship beneath it, in the water, but as she closed in, leaping from one dry patch of land to another, she saw it wasn’t completely submerged. Not even close.

Someone whispered near her ship. It was followed by a snicker.

She jumped onto the ship’s roof and rounded on the fuckers.

There were six of them, dressed in black, with masks made of piping hoses and old-style oxygen breathers. Some held flashlights like bats, but others had rusty knives. They lifted their faces and stared up at her, laughing behind their tubes.

“This ship is mine,” Kinyi growled.

“Finders keepers,” they sang in unison. They were young, likely not even adults.

But Kinyi would kill them anyway. And not an ounce of her would feel guilty for it.

She jumped down, knocking into two raiders and sending them bowling into a third. With a sweeping kick, she took out the one beside her. The others were on her before she’d recovered her footing, swatting with their flashlights and slicing at her with their old blades.

She threw one off her back and punched another in his soft belly. It should have broken his spine, but the kid barely grunted.

Fuck, she was pulling her punches. She couldn’t make herself truly hurt these little bastards. They were just kids.

One kicked her shin, and she smacked him. She caught the tiniest one in the group by the collar and lifted him off the ground. He kicked his feet in the air, yowling like a wildcat. The others froze.

“Now,” Kinyi said, huffing a bit. “Step back from my ship.”

“This ain’t your ship,” one of the ruffians called back. With the masks muffling their voices, it was impossible to tell which one had spoken.

“It is.”

“But it’s alien!”

Kinyi cocked an eyebrow at the lot. “And you don’t think I’m alien?”

“You’ve got two legs!”

“Yeah! You don’t even have a tail!”

They were even younger than she’d thought. Their voices turned high-pitched with excitement, revealing their youth.

She set the kid down and he scampered away.

“Listen,” she said. “I’ll let you go, but drop any parts you took.”

“We didn’t get any!”

“Not even a rusty nut!”

With a ripping growl, she leaped from the roof of her ship, splashing into the marsh as the street brats scattered. They dissolved into the shadows with peals of laughter, but they moved too fast for Kinyi to grab one by the collar. Her boots were instantly marred, her jacket soaking up even more water. She would have given anything to ring a neck or two.

“Looks like you hid it really well.”

She slowly turned toward the sound of Tane’s voice. He stood at the nose of her ship, body propped against the metal and arms crossed over his massive chest. His boots weren’t even wet.

“Where the hell were you?”

He lifted a shoulder. “Didn’t want to interrupt.”

Kinyi’s vision tilted with bright slashes of red. She could have throttled Tane too, but she took a deep breath instead. Slowly, she exhaled. Rage management. She was in control of how she reacted. It was a mantra she had to repeat because she was often in a position where she had to decide between ripping someone’s head off or taking the high road.

“It doesn’t matter now,” she said. She swiped a leech off her jacket. “I’m leaving this horrible planet. My people—our people—need me.”

“I don’t think you’re going anywhere.”

Kinyi’s body stiffened. “Is that a threat?”

Tane snorted. “Don’t think so highly of yourself. I meant that.” He lifted his chin, indicating something behind Kinyi.

She turned around.

The entire underside of her ship had been scavenged. The metal casing had been peeled back like a hard-boiled egg to reveal disconnected wires, missing plates, entire control panels just gone. Her ship was a skeleton forgotten in the desert. Those kids had carted off almost her entire ship before she even got here.

“Those motherfuckers!” she shouted, her voice echoing off the Deluge.

Tane laughed.