When Izzy came around, her eyes wouldn’t open. She tried moving, and her body didn’t respond, yet she could hear voices in the room.
“I know.” She heard Mikhlas sigh and the rustle of what sounded like fabric. “I don’t know what came over me. She looked…fragile. Wounded and yet still somehow…”
“Determined,” Silian said. “I saw that too. You know we’re bigger than most of the population here, and this gravity well is five percent lighter than standard. We must look and move to her in a way that is…very intimidating.
“I get the feeling most people on this planet would have curled into a ball at the position we put her in. Yet as soon as she got over the initial shock, the queen reacted…quite well.
“It’ll be interesting to see what she’s like when she doesn’t have broken bones to deal with.”
“Yet,” Silian continued, “you’ve met capable women before, Mikhlas. What madness seized you—”
“I’m sorry, Captain. I just…”
“You just what?”
“I hope the feeling is returned. I’d hate to have to execute you.”
“I know. But trust me, brother, it was worth it,” Mikhlas said.
“I think she is waking up,” Silian said. “Prime, remove the skin.”
Izzy felt the same tingling as before, like a million tiny ants with feathered feet, dance across her skin. As it receded, the feeling in her limbs returned.
When the sensation finished, she opened her eyes and saw Silian and Mikhlas standing on either side of the bed, their posture formal. She looked from one to the other and back again.
“What did you do to me?” she asked. Mikhlas smiled and gestured to the floor.
“Why don’t you try moving? Can you get up?” Mikhlas asked.
She pulled her shirt up to look at herself. The bruises on her side were all gone. A small scar on her ribs traced across her skin where she expected to see a six-inch surgical cut.
She ran her fingers over it, and it felt faint and tiny, like a wound healed many years ago.
“What did you do?”
“I will never lie to you. When I said we needed to heal you, I spoke the truth,” he said.
“How...? How is this possible?” she asked.
“Isabelle, allow me to introduce you to Prime,” Mikhlas said.
Izzy looked around the room, but they were alone. She frowned and opened her mouth to speak.
“Hello, Dakira Isabelle. You may call me Prime. I am the primary operating system of the ship,” Izzy heard a feminine voice say in her ear. Her hand shot up to the side of her face, but she could not feel a headset.
“What is that?” Izzy asked, digging her finger into her ear.
“It’s an inner ear communication device. Prime morphed one for you when she healed you,” Silian said.
“Morphed one?” Izzy asked, ripping open the thick Velcro straps of her leg support before standing up and feeling the blissful relief of no pain.
“Yes. It’s made from millions of tiny nanites. The same nanites Prime uses to heal,” Mikhlas said and moved around the bed toward her. She looked between the two of them a few times.
The two of them exchanged a glance before Mikhlas turned to her.
“You must not have an equivalent in your language. It means...called, accepted. It’s hard to describe now that I think about it. She must have used it as an honorific instead of queen. You only become queen after your ascension.”
But how did they heal her? She’d expected months of recovery. Was she asleep for that long?
“How long did it take?” she asked, looking at them. They stood stiff and straight with shoulders back, both fists held to the chest in some kind of salute with their heads bowed.
“Nine Earth hours, Dakira Isabelle,” Silian said, raising his head.
“That’s not possible,” she whispered to herself, a catalog of her injuries running through her mind.
“Dakira Isabelle, please believe us. Everything we told you is the truth,” Mikhlas said.
“No. It’s not possible. This can’t be possible,” she said.
“Why not?” he asked.
“Because you can’t be aliens. I cannot be your queen. I’m just a woman trying to raise two boys as best I can. I can’t go off to the other side of the Universe and be a queen.
“I don’t know anything about being royalty. How did I even get chosen? It’s too insane to be true,” she laughed, hearing the edge of hysteria in her voice as she babbled.
“Is it crazy to think that human beings are alone in the Universe? Your people have only ever seen a tiny speck of it. Is it crazy to think that out there, in all that vastness, there is a place that has life?” Mikhlas asked.
He now stood in front of her. She heard everything he said, and she understood it in the literal way, but it felt so far-fetched that she needed more proof.
“Why me?” she asked.
“You were chosen by the five Sentinels. We were sent here to retrieve you and escort you back,” Mikhlas said. She looked up at him and stared into his blue eyes.
“What are the Sentinels?” she asked.
“Who, not what. They are...complicated to explain. Suffice to say they are the five beings of creation in the Realm. They watch over us, and they chose you to rule. Such is the way of the Citizens of the Realm.
“When a Monarch dies, the Sentinels search the Universe for a replacement. I don’t know why they chose you. You’ll have to ask them.”
Izzy shook her head. “You make them sound like gods,” she muttered. She looked at her shaking hands and crossed her arms before tilting her head to look at them.
“You realize this makes no sense at all. I am no ruler. I don’t know anything about what you’re talking about. Why would they choose me?” she said.
Mikhlas smiled at her. “I suppose that is the only question that matters. Perhaps they see something in you that you do not.”
“I need to think,” Izzy said after a few blank seconds.
She backed out of the room slowly, and when she stood by the stairs, she looked down and remembered the pain that stopped her from coming up here when she first arrived.
Despite the insanity of it, the physical evidence could not be refuted. She lifted her shirt and looked at that faint scar along her ribs again. No one here on Earth had the technology to heal a person so fast.
She slowly descended the stairs and walked into the kitchen and looked around. The gun no longer sat on the kitchen bench, but she wasn’t surprised by that. She turned the kettle on and stood against the counter, thinking.
The kettle clicked off as the door opened behind her. Mikhlas came in and leaned against the wall, crossing his arms with an unreadable expression on his face.
Izzy turned back to the kettle, her mind running through everything she heard and saw. Before she knew it, two more cups stood on the green linoleum bench.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t even ask if you want this,” she said, turning back to the cups. She lifted the spoon to the sugar bowl and her hand shook, clattering against the rim.
This whole situation scared her in so many ways. It was crazy and fantastic, but scary. Mikhlas’s hand gently came into vision, held out for the spoon.
“Let me, Dakira Isabelle.”
She put the spoon in his hand and stepped back, and with efficient movements, he added sugar to the cups.
“I didn’t ask you either,” he said in a small voice.
“Can I say no?”
“No. It’s not up to me. I’m just here to protect you.”
“I can’t be who you want me to be,” she said, crossing her arms. He stirred the coffee in the cups, silent for moments before he turned to look at her.
“Why not?” he asked.
“I can’t leave this…Earth,” she said.
“I cannot return without you.”
She shuddered at the implacable note in his voice before his tone pissed her off. “I can’t leave James and Lucas. I won’t leave my sons behind. That’s never going to happen.”
“I understand. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before. You will not need to leave them behind. They are the Royal Princes. They must come with us.”
She felt deflated. Geared up to fight not to leave her kids and disarmed at his casual response. “I still think you should find someone else to do this,” she said, reaching for the cup of steaming coffee as if it were a lifeline to shore.
“That is not how it works. It’s you. And only you.”
She blew on the coffee before taking a sip that warmed her as she swallowed. “I just…I need some time to process this. You’re asking me to leave everything behind.”
“I know. But we only have a few days. Then we must return.”
He straightened and walked to the door. He turned to say something to her, but her phone started buzzing on the counter.
Mikhlas stopped himself and nodded to her. When he left the room, she picked it up and put it to her ear.
“Hello?”
“Iz. What the hell, why aren’t you answering the phone again?” Amy shouted over the line.
“I’m sorry, I was…sleeping,”
“Are you ok?” Amy asked, her voice calming.
“I’m fine,” she said, looking down at herself with a small smile.
“I’m ten minutes away, in town. Do you need me to bring anything?” Amy asked.
“Yeah. Um…Grab some food. And a few bottles of wine.”
“Wine? Won’t that interfere with your meds?” Amy said.
“A lot of wine,” Izzy said and hung up the phone.
