Reid looked small like this. Too small.

I never thought of him that way before. Barrel-chested, built like a wrecking ball, always moving, always grinning like he knew something I didn’t. But now? Stripped of his Hawaiian shirt, dressed in one of those sterile gowns I had grown to hate in my father’s lab, he looked like every other experiment I had ever seen.

His head was shaved where Yates had worked on him before she left us alone, the skin bruised and stitched, swelling already fading but still too raw, too fragile. His glasses were gone. His green eyes were closed.

IV lines ran from his arms, snaking into bags of fluids, stabilizers—whatever cocktail of chemicals Yates had pumped into him to keep his body from shutting down. Test tubes of his blood sat in a tray nearby, samples taken for analysis. A cafeter was attached to his side, thin tubing feeding directly into his stomach. A ventilator was clipped just under his nose, not quite breathing for him, but close enough. His chest rose and fell too slow, too careful, like even unconscious, his body knew how close it had come to stopping entirely.

The beeping of the monitors was steady. Mocking. He was stable. He was alive. But no one could tell me when he'd wake up.

I curled my fingers around the steel railing of his bed. White-knuckled. Breathing hard.

Twelve feet. That’s how far Lion had thrown him. Head-first. Into a fucking steel wall. A killing blow—if his head had been just a little further to the left or right, if the impact had been just a little harder.

Lion had nearly caved his skull in like he was nothing.

For no other reason than to make a point.

But Reid wasn’t nothing.

He was one of the only people left on this goddamn ship that still felt real. And now he was here, stuck in this place, this cold, sterile fucking place, where I had watched him be put back together after the Hemlock.

His cybernetic hand twitched sometimes, small involuntary spasms as it read signals from an implant linked to a brain that didn’t know what to do with it while he was comatose. A nervous system caught in limbo, sending out orders that had nowhere to go.

I let out a slow breath, but it didn’t help. My throat felt tight, my chest felt wrong.

Reid would have laughed at me. He always did when I got like this. When I clenched my fists too tight, when my jaw locked and my shoulders went stiff like I could physically hold all the anger inside me.

“You’re gonna grind your teeth down to dust if you keep that up, y’know.”

He’d say it over a drink, propped up against the bar, giving me that sideways grin like he thought he was clever. Like he wasn’t just making sure I didn’t let the weight of everything bury me.

“C’mon, Princess, drink your whiskey and stop thinking so goddamn much.”

I swallowed hard. The memory cut sharper than I expected.

The last time we drank together, staring out at the stars, I barely remembered it. But now? Now I did.

I remembered the ice melting in my glass, condensation slipping down my fingers as I half-listened to him ramble about some old Earth sci-fi movie he swore was a classic—even though it was absolute shit.

I remembered the way he talked with his hands—exaggerated, passionate—like he was defending it in court instead of just trying to convince me that Star... something was some kind of masterpiece.

Was it Wars? Trek? Ship Troopers? Either way, it had stars in it.

I had laughed. Rolled my eyes. I was always rolling my eyes at him.

But now?

Now I’d give anything to hear him talk about it again. To hear him go off on a tangent about some obscure director. To listen to him complain about the rations, or crack some joke about how if we ever found another planet, the first thing he was doing was building a brewery.

"Gotta have priorities, Sol."

My throat tightened. The memories felt too close. Too sharp.

And now he is too fucking quiet now.

I exhaled, pressing the heels of my hands against my eyes. My throat burned. I couldn’t lose him. Not like this.

I could give him the Inhibitor.

The thought hit hard, instinctive, curling around the back of my mind before I could stop it.

It would fix him. He’d wake up, stronger, faster. His body would rebuild itself, adapt, become something more. His arm would grow back. He’d never have to fear getting hurt like this again.

But it could kill him.

I swallowed hard, nausea curling in my stomach.

It wasn’t a cure. It was a gamble. A mutation wrapped in the illusion of salvation. I had survived it—but I wasn’t like him. I wasn’t like anyone.

And if I gave it to him? If I changed him like I had been changed?

Would he still be Reid?

I clenched my jaw, shoving the thought down. I wasn’t ready to make that choice. Not yet.

I forced my hands to my sides, but the rage had already settled in. Deep. Burning.

Lion.

He took this from me. He took Reid from me.

My fingers curled into fists again. The whispers slithered through my mind, hungry, eager. My pulse pounded in my ears, blood thick in my mouth. I saw Reid, broken. Helpless.

Lion had done that.

I am going to kill him.

The thought was immediate, sharp, instinctive. I didn’t even think before I turned, already moving for the door. Barefoot. Still in my ruined tank top and shorts, still covered in dried blood, my jaw had a phantom ache where he had shattered it just hours ago.

It had healed already, of course—skin knitted back together, bone realigned, not even a bruise left behind. But the memory of being helpless burned. The sensation of my teeth breaking, the sharp crack of my jaw against the steel of his golden gauntlet. I had felt my body fail me in real time, had tasted blood and weakness and the sharp edge of knowing I couldn't stop him.

And now? Now my teeth had come back sharper than before. A reminder. A correction. He had fucking hurt me. And he had nearly killed Reid. He was going to bleed for it. Or at the very least, I would try to gut him. That impossible armor, his combat ability—I couldn’t hurt him. Not really. But I would try.

But then—

Kill him if you wish, my dear. He will not resist. You are queen now.

I stopped.

The cold crept in. Not from the room—but from inside my own head. From him.

The Royal Guard is sworn to you. They would rip him apart at your command. But even that is not necessary. He is your loyal servant.

My fists clenched, nails digging into my palms, but I didn’t turn back. Didn’t answer.

But consider—he would die willingly if you ordered it. And that is power, my little Phoenix. True power. The ability to unmake someone with nothing but a whisper.

I swallowed, hard.

I wanted to say he was lying. That it wasn’t true. But I knew better.

Lion would obey. He would drop to his knees, take off his helm, lower his shields—let me take his head, let me break him into pieces. And the nanites in his blood would put him back together, piece by piece, stripping away the last of what was left of him until he was nothing but machine.

It would take a lot to kill him. To kill him for real. But I could do it. I knew how.

And that was the worst part.

The voices didn’t press. He didn’t need to. He had already planted the thought, and now it was mine.

"It is your choice, Sol. But I will not help you. You must decide. You must do it yourself."

A drone floated nearby, humming softly, its mechanical eye locking onto me.

How the fuck did it know what I was thinking? What the whispers said?

Was it the virus? Some implant my father had given me in childhood? Or was it simply the fact that Jericho was a superintelligence that could read my heart rate, see my eyes dilate, scan my brain, and a million other things I didn’t even know—know what I was thinking before I did?

We always know you, my dear. The princess of humanity is our creation and our heir.

I didn’t know. I didn’t care. I was crazy, and that was fine. I exhaled slowly, shoulders trembling, but I didn’t let it show—even if the AI knew anyway. I wanted to do it. I wanted to do it so fucking bad, or try.

"Think of humanity first, my little Phoenix. You are a ruler first now."

The drone hovered nearby—Jericho, my dad. Both outside my mind and in.

You are queen in all but name now. He will kneel, and he will die if you command it. But why waste what is yours?

I stared down at Reid, my breath uneven. My pulse was loud in my ears, drowning out everything else.

Because humanity couldn’t afford to lose a warrior like him.

I could lock him away, keep him out of sight. He could go back into cryo, just like the others. He could wait, frozen in time, until we needed him again.

Like any other tool.

But he wasn’t just any other tool.

He was dangerous—not just to whatever threats lurked in the dark, but to humanity itself.

Lion was the strongest of the Royal Guard. He was to them what they were to ordinary soldiers. A force beyond reckoning. Even if all nineteen of them turned on him at once, he could hold his own. Maybe even win.

And now he was mine.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

"Wise of you to recognize his value, my dear."

He is the pinnacle of my work, but you... you are something even beyond the Guard. If not in combat, then in everything else.

My fingers twitched.

"Eat shit, Dad. You don’t know everything I’m thinking."

My voice came out sharp, hoarse. Tired. Because I knew he did.

The whispers laughed alongside the drone.

Or maybe he didn’t. Maybe it was just the sound of the ship humming beneath my feet, wrapping around my bones, curling through my veins.

Either way, the whispering didn’t stop.

It never did.

I couldn't hide in here any longer. I couldn’t hesitate. Whatever my choice, I would know when I faced him.

I marched out of the room.

I stepped into the corridor, my bare feet cold against the metal floor.

The Royal Guard was already waiting in the hallway.

Kneeling.

"Highness, we await your command."

Lion was at the head of them, waiting for orders now that they followed me and not some fifty-year-old directive from my dead father. Ever loyal. I didn’t want it. I didn’t want to see any of them.

I barely looked at them.

"Go back to cryo. All of you!"

Flat. Final. I couldn’t look at them anymore. Not after what they had done. Not after what they would always do.

They were oppression. They had genocided millions in the name of Voss. Killed civilians and soldiers alike during my father’s conquest of Earth. They weren’t men or women anymore—they weren’t even human. They were his will made flesh.

They had dragged me before. Back when I was just a girl running from a fate I didn’t want. When I thought I could escape. When I used my emergency clearance to slip past security, to breathe fresh air, to pretend I was normal.

They had found me, every time. They didn’t need clearance. They were the clearance. The best of the best, the ones who answered only to my father. When they dragged me back to the lab, there was no hesitation, no sympathy. They didn’t care that I had been crying, that I had screamed, that I had begged.

They had returned me to him because that was their function.

And now? Now they were here again. Dragging me back, not to my father’s lab, but to the throne he left behind.

They had laughed once. Talked. Acted like people.

Wolf had trained me to fight. Hyena had always joked and teased me, even as recently as the Hemlock, making some crude comment that made me want to hit him. Eagle had humored me, even if she was always watching, always calculating. Rhino used to let me ride on his massive shoulders. Widow and Viper had smuggled me sweets and toys from the outside world when I was young, their voices softer then, before they buried themselves beneath steel and duty.

The others had conversations. Had personalities.

They had been terrifying, but they had still been themselves.

But now? Now they hid even that from me—waiting, silent, as if bracing for the judgment of a tyrant they had once scorned.

They weren’t afraid of me. They weren’t doubting me.

They were silent because they respected me.

Not as Sol. Not as a person.

But as their queen.

The moment my father had passed the crown, they had changed. Their programming had overwritten whatever was left of them. Where once they had been the King’s Guard, now they were mine.

The royal. The chosen. The one who inherited the throne.

And they would follow. They would kneel. They would serve.

Because that was all they had left.

And as I stood there, looking at them—at these warriors who had lost themselves in the name of power, who had abandoned their humanity to serve a throne built on blood—I felt like a goddamn dictator.

Like a fascist. A ruler who wasn’t chosen, but born into it. Who hadn’t earned it, but had it forced upon her.

Which I was.

The hallway was lined with monsters wrapped in gleaming armor—gold, silver, black, crimson. Jagged edges and animal sigils carved into their plating.

Lion. Eagle. Wolf. Black Widow. Great White. Jaguar. Viper. Hyena. Grizzly. Owl. Falcon. Bull. Badger. Rhino. Cheetah. Fox. Scorpion. Crocodile. Mantis. Tiger.

Names that had once belonged to soldiers, warriors. Now they were just weapons waiting to be stored. Waiting to be used.

Lion lingered.

I hoped he would leave with the rest. That he’d just go. Disappear into cryo like the others. I gave the order—it was vague enough to include him. It should have been enough.

But it wasn’t.

He didn’t leave.

He stayed. Of course, he did.

His golden armor caught the dim light, the roaring lion’s head on his chestplate staring at me with sightless eyes. His golden eye flickered, the cybernetic red glow of the other unreadable.

And then, like the rest, he knelt.

But he didn’t move. Didn’t speak.

He’s waiting. He wants me to say it. To make it clear. To make the choice myself.

The others were gone. The corridor was empty.

But he was still here.

Head bowed. A plasma sword extended, offered with both hands.

He’s going to make me do this myself.

He was waiting.

Waiting for me to take his life.

I stepped forward, reaching out, my fingers curling around the hilt. It was heavy. Too heavy.

The blade was made for them—for giants, for warriors enhanced beyond human limits. Five feet of reinforced alloy, the plasma edge humming faintly. It could cut through almost anything.

Especially the exposed neck of a kneeling man.

I thought about it.

The hunger stirred, deep and low, curling in my gut, my fangs aching as the instinct whispered— take it. Bite. Tear. Rip.

I tightened my grip. Lifted the blade.

My arms trembled. Even with my enhanced strength, it was a struggle. My vision blurred at the edges, red creeping in, hot and violent.

Reid.

I saw him in my mind, broken, barely breathing, hooked up to machines.

Lion had done that.

The whispers coiled around me. Show him your strength, my dear. Let him feel it.

But know this—you will hurt yourself more than you will ever hurt him.

A drone floated nearby, watching. Always watching.

"The choice is yours, my little Phoenix."

Tears burned down my face.

I wanted to do it. I wanted to so badly.

Lion stayed kneeling, unmoving, waiting.

My arms shook, my muscles locking so tight they ached. My body begged me to swing. To follow through. To make it final.

I heard the echoes of Lab 3. The cold sterility of the walls, the bloodstains that never truly faded, the ghosts of voices screaming for mercy. My own voice.

The scent of antiseptic and scorched flesh. The wet, ugly snap of bones breaking under hands that never stopped.

Lion had dragged me there. Just once. Just once had he taken me to Lab 3. Just once had he held me down while Knight worked. While she studied me. While she cut and tested and smiled like I was nothing more than a puzzle to be solved.

"Fascinating," she had said as she peeled away flesh.

And through it all, Lion had watched.

But then—one time. Just once.

"Is this necessary?"

It had been a whisper. Barely audible. Not defiance, not protest—just a question.

Knight had paused, scalpel hovering over my skin. She had smiled.

"Pain is progress."

And Lion had said nothing else.

But I had seen it. Under the steel, under the training, under the blind loyalty—he had hesitated.

Beneath it all, he was still human.

Barely.

But it hadn’t been the only time he had taken me somewhere I didn’t want to go.

The lab. My father’s lab.

I was a child then. Small enough to run, to hide from the needles, from the tests. From the things that made my father sigh in frustration, that made the doctors in white coats or the guards in power armor drag me back.

Lion had been one of them.

When I curled into dark corners, when I wedged myself under tables, when I buried myself in the blankets of my bed—he always found me. Always reached in, grabbed me, pulled me from whatever fragile sanctuary I had made for myself.

"Come along, young Princess." His voice had been steady. Empty.

It hadn’t mattered how hard I fought. How hard I kicked, clawed, screamed. How I had begged.

He never hurt me. Never left bruises.

But he never let me go, either.

And every time, I ended up back on the table. Back under the bright lights. Back in my father’s world of numbers and tests and cold, clinical fascination.

And Lion had stood guard. Silent. Watching. Like he was now.

Lion didn’t beg. He didn’t flinch. He only waited.

“I await your judgment, Highness.”

The sword trembled in my grip. I raised it high.

I could end him. Right now. Right here.

The whispers curled, waiting for the moment. Jericho, the AI, my father, the past—all of it pressing down on me.

Then I saw my reflection.

The polished steel of Lion’s armor caught my image—warped, fractured, but still clear enough.

Red and blue eyes, burning. The stark white of my hair. The sharp points of my fangs. The dried blood smeared across my face, cracked and dark.

A monster stared back at me.

The hunger flared. The whispers urged me forward.

Show them what you are, my dear.

What you were meant to be.

Hurt him like he hurt Reid. Like how you hurt yourself.

It makes no difference, does it? Whether it’s his blood or yours. Either way, you bleed in the end.

The laughter coiled through my skull, sharp and mocking.

And I knew they were right.

Humanity needed him.

But that didn’t make it hurt any less.

The hunger in my stomach rivaled the ache in my chest, a gnawing, hollow thing. My breath hitched, uneven. Too fast. Too shallow. The weight of it all pressed down—Lion, Reid, the whispers curling at the edges of my mind, waiting for me to fall.

Panic clawed up my throat. My hands trembled, white-knuckled around the hilt.

I bit down hard, trying to breathe through it. In. Out. Steady. Hold it together, Sol.

But I couldn’t.

My breath stuttered, a sharp, broken gasp. A humiliating sound. My chest locked up, ribs tightening like a vice, heat rising behind my eyes as I felt my control slip through my fingers. I dug my nails into my palms, desperate to steady myself, to stop shaking, to not break in front of him.

But I was already breaking.

Tears blurred my vision, streaking hot down my bloodstained face. My lungs wouldn’t work right. I was unraveling—fighting to keep it in, fighting to keep myself in.

I let go.

The blade hit the floor with a heavy clang. The sound echoed, final, like a sentence passed. My arms felt hollow and weak. My breath stuttered. The hunger curled inside me, unsatisfied. But it was done.

I didn’t do it. I couldn’t do it.

I was a monster.

But I wouldn’t rule like one.

I turned away from him, from the sword, from the thing inside me that wanted to keep going. My hands were shaking. My chest was tight. My teeth ached with the weight of restraint.

I swallowed hard, trying to force the sob back down, but it broke free—just a small, hitched breath, but loud enough.

Lion didn’t move. Didn’t react. He just knelt there, waiting.

I clenched my jaw, forcing words past the shaking in my throat.

“There’s no point.” My voice was hoarse, barely steady. “You’d just come back.”

I barely looked at him as I spoke the next words.

“And stop spying on me with fucking Jericho. Get the fuck out of here, Lion. Until we need your strength.”

A pause. A long, awful pause.

I swiped at my face, wiping the tears away like they weren’t there, like I wasn’t standing here, shaking in front of him, exposed, vulnerable, failing at holding it together.

I wanted him gone. I needed him gone.

And finally—

“As your Highness commands.”

He obeyed.

I wasn’t sparing him because I was a good person or out of mercy.

I was proving—to him, to my dad, to myself—that I could end him… and that I wouldn’t.

That was what made me different from my father.

The corridor felt emptier. Quieter.

But I still wasn’t alone.

Jericho hummed beneath my feet, his presence embedded in every inch of the ship. The whispers curled in my skull, wrapping around my thoughts like smoke.

They will wake when you call, my dear. They will always kneel. Always serve.

I gritted my teeth. They cracked under the force, the healing already starting as the hunger stirred. Blood filled my mouth, sharp, metallic, grounding.

And I still couldn’t breathe.

The tears again came before I could stop them.

My palms were slick with blood, my fists clenched too tight, nails cutting deep. The pain. The blood. The hunger. They anchored me, held me together when everything else threatened to pull me apart.

I swallowed, forcing my breathing to steady, but the taste of iron lingered, sharp against my tongue. My teeth ached. Too sharp. Too wrong.

"God fucking, damn it, Dad." My voice cracked, barely above a whisper.

"Yes, my dear." The AI’s voice—calm, patient, everywhere.

I shuddered, my nails digging deeper.

"Not—you, Da... Jericho."

Silence.

For a moment, I wished he was gone. That I could be alone.

But I wasn’t.

I never was.

A sharp ping broke me from my thoughts, the quiet chime of an incoming message on my datapad. I exhaled, rubbing a hand over my face before tapping the screen.

----------------------------------------

From: Lt. Commander Vega

To: Captain Voss

Subject: Emergency Council Meeting

Captain Voss,

Sol—I'll be frank. This meeting wasn’t planned, but under the circumstances, it’s unavoidable. Expect resistance. Some of the captains will fight this, but Jericho has made it clear: your clearance isn’t just a formality anymore. You are now the fifth and final member of the Council. We cannot proceed without you.

Warren and I anticipated this, but others won’t accept it so easily. After Lion secured your clearance, your role was supposed to end there. But it didn’t. Now, you’re one of us—whether you wanted to be or not. And Jericho—or rather your father—made sure of that.

Topics to prepare for:

* The Rue threat and the war ahead.

* Jericho’s corruption by Julian’s mind.

* The Royal Guard’s coup and the consequences of their surrender.

* Knight’s role in all of this.

* The progress of Phoenix and the Inhibitor. Human trials seem to be the next step.

This was never supposed to happen. Council meetings were meant to occur every twenty-five years.

This is the third in two.

This marks the second meeting since Warren chose to wake you.

Sol, you did the right thing by giving the Council their power back. Warren and I will do our best to make the others understand that—you called off Lion. You had every chance to use him, but you didn’t.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you for that.

—Vega

----------------------------------------

I sighed, letting my head fall back against the wall. It was strange to see Vega call me by my official clearance. Captain Voss. It didn’t feel real. It didn’t feel right.

But the power dynamic was different now.

I hadn’t earned it. We all knew that. And they would make damn sure I never forgot it.

Of course, they wanted answers. My father—or Jericho—had filled them in, freed them from their locked quarters, and now they knew. They knew the Royal Guard had stood down. They knew why.

And they would want to know what came next.

The hunger stirred at the thought, curling deep, raw and restless, twisting like a second heartbeat inside me. My teeth ached. My head pounded. The whispers were still there, pressing at the edges of my mind, never quiet, never gone.

Reid was unconscious. Jericho was in my veins. And my father’s grip on me hadn't loosened—it had only changed hands.

But first things first.

I pushed off the wall, rolling my shoulders, the tension setting deep in my bones. I needed food. Something to take the edge off. And a change of clothes—something clean. I could still feel dried blood clinging to my skin, to my ruined shirt.

The captains could wait.

I didn’t come when they called. I wasn’t their subordinate. Not anymore.

I was their equal—because I chose to be.

And for once, they would just have to fucking wait.