Chapter Text
Sora woke up in the dark on the cold floor of the Imperium cell. Black stone handcuffs anchored her hands to the floor and she contorted her body to sit up around it. She might as well have awoken in her parents’ home in the cage that had been the walls of the Imperium. Sora groaned as she tried to collect her scattered thoughts and set them in order. If her eyes hadn’t deceived her, she had counted at least two foreigners wearing Imperium ranks. She had known about the decorated Lord Ras, as every good student of the Imperium was taught in schools, who had lead the hunt for the most famous dragons of the current age. Even so, nobody had questioned him, nor from where he had come. Now, there was the one in commandant’s dress, who had been permitted to be tattooed like a native citizen of the Imperium. He was a human dragon as well. They two and Sora made three to prove that the walls of the Imperium were no longer as impenetrable as they had been made to seem from either side.
She tugged experimentally on the short length of chain binding her wrists to the floor. There was a girl crying in another cell down the row. Sora assumed that it was Maiya from the redness of her eyes when she had seen her in the throne room. That girl’s eyes had burned with a hatred of the Imperium that almost compelled Sora to grieve for the accident of her own birth.
“Hello?” Sora called. She grunted as she pushed herself to her feet and strained against her bindings of her hands. The guard rotation was coming, so she sat back down, just in case they were searching for good behaviour to reward.
“Oi! Yeah, I’m talking to you! You can’t just walk by! Let me out, and I’ll fight you all, or are none of you man enough to fight me?”
“They’re not going to hear you,” called Sora. “Their helmets block out the sound.”
“Yeah? What do you know about that?” Maiya called. Her voice was barely there, but she screamed through it anyways.
“I designed them that way,” replied Sora sadly, but loudly enough for Maiya to hear. She deserved to know, and Sora needed to confess. She sat against the door as best she could, like an impromptu confession booth.
“You’re Imperium? Let me out, I’ll kill you, too! You deserve it just as bad as them!” Maiya struck the cell wall. Her hands must not have been bound, not that it would have made any difference in an Imperium holding cell.
“Why do you hate the Imperium?”
“Why do I- why don’t I hate Imperium?” Maiya exclaimed. “They killed my mother! That arsehole, the Commandant? That used to be my f*cking father! My uncle is being held somewhere here, and they beat the living sh*t out of all of us! When I get out of here, I’m going to beat the sh*t-eating grin off that stupid empress’ face if it’s the last f*cking thing I do! Right after I kill that damn excuse of a father of mine.”
“Don’t talk about the good Empress that way,” called Sora, out of caution that was lost on Maiya. She scoffed.
“You’re just as deaf as the damn guards.”
“She’s always listening. If you think it can’t get any worse, it can. I’ve seen what they do to dragons.”
“Oh, don’t you mean what you do to dragons?”
“I haven’t done any of that since the Merge. I left the Imperium on purpose,” Sora called, “and I came here to save a baby dragon.”
“Like that makes any of that right. How many dragons are getting harvested because of things you made?” Maiya coughed. Sora’s eyes brimmed with her tears. “Listen to yourself. You got yourself out of Imperium and never got Imperium out of you. ‘The good Empress’. ‘The Imperium’. Get a goddamn grip! You’re still Imperium, through and through. Just because you’re in a cell, too, doesn’t mean you’re ever going to be pardoned for what you’ve done.”
Sora and Maiya sat in each others’ silence. She had nothing else to say to her. In all honestly, Sora would admit that Maiya had every right to be angry with her. One baby dragon didn’t hold a torch to the multitudes of dragons that had come down on the other end of the things she and Jordana had made together in the Advanced Systems Lab. More than that, they were the ideas that they had unthinkingly enjoyed bringing to fruition. For this, she deserved Jordana’s anger as well. Sora laid on the floor of the cell as comfortably as she could and imagined that it was her childhood bedroom. The Photac was merely a collection of scraps on her workbench. She was ten years old again, and no doubt had ever crossed her mind and she could still believe that she was free.
“Ana!”
She raised her head groggily from her bedroom floor. Gentle morning light streamed in through the tall windows. Ana raised her head and stretched as her mother knocked on her door again. She slowly balled her fist and relaxed her fingers as the pins-and-needles sensation pricked her uncomfortably back to waking consciousness.
“Ana, I’m coming in. Good graces, your room is a mess!” Ana’s mother stood in the doorway with her arms firmly crossed as Ana rubbed her eyes. She must have fallen asleep on the floor.
“What time is it?”
“It’s time for you to set an alarm. You’re going to be late for class.”
“Oh!” Ana leapt to her feet as her mother sighed and leaned against the doorway. She shoved her books into her bag and hopped on one foot, then the other as she slid on her shoes. Ana grabbed her lunchbox from the kitchen table and hastily untied her messy hair in the hallway mirror. She threw open the door to the moving sidewalk that was already bustling with people heading into work. Behind her, her mother cleared her throat.
“Aren’t you forgetting something?”
Ana ran back and threw her arms around her mother quickly.
“Bye, Mum. I love you.” But her mother just chuckled.
“Your science project,” she said. Ana slapped her palm against her forehead as her mother tucked her project into her bag, then kissed her head. “Have a good day at school. Don’t forget to ask Mr. Koenig about extra credit.”
“I will, Mum! Bye, Mum!”
She hurried along the moving sidewalk until she caught up with the last of the stragglers making their way slowly towards school. The bell rang as Ana slid into her seat. Jordana giggled as Ana slumped against the table.
“Were you practising for getting your tattoos?” Jordana whispered. At the front of the class, their teacher began to take attendance.
“Huh?” Ana asked. Jordana traced one finger along her own face where Ana’s sleeve had left impressed marks on her face from sleeping on one bent arm. “Oh. I slept funny, I guess.”
“Jordana?”
“Present!” She called as her hand shot into the air. Jordana laughed one last time at Ana’s dishevelled appearance as Ana pulled her hair ties from her wrists to offer them to her friend. The teacher began discussing the lesson on the board at the front of the classroom.
“Can you do my hair?”
“You can do your hair yourself.”
“Yeah, but you do it better.”
Sora’s cell door opened without a sound and closed the same way.
“Oi.”
Sora pulled herself groggily from her fantasy.
“Who’s there?”
“Shh.” She looked up to the face of an Imperium guard in full dress, cloak and all. Sora scrambled away until her chains jerked and snapped against the floor. She took in every detail of her captor’s dress as the helmet was removed to reveal a familiar face. Nagako pressed her finger over her painted lips as her other hand reached beneath her cloak to reveal-
“Raiyu!” Sora exclaimed. Nagako placed the baby dragon gently on the floor before beckoning Sora back to her as she brandished the key that would free her. The boss of the Crossroads knelt to unlock the handcuffs and place them quietly on the ground as Raiyu climbed into Sora’s arms. She scratched him under the chin and he rewarded her with a weak purr. Though she yearned to feel elemental power burning through her veins, she saw the weariness in his eyes as he curled up in her arms to rest.
“As promised, Imperium tech,” Nagako whispered as she placed a standard-issue Imperium rifle on the floor in front of Sora as quietly as she had set down the cuffs. “As genuine as it gets.”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Goodness of my heart. Get to your feet.” Nagako placed the helmet back on her head. Her hair must have been wrapped several times around her shoulders. Between that and the dragon and the rifle, Sora finally understood the cloak. She took the rifle in her hands and felt all its familiar sleek edges and holds. The memory of its prototype haunted her now. She knew it as intimately as an estranged son. Raiyu climbed onto her shoulders and Nagako led the way out of the cell. They stopped once and Sora’s heart rose to her throat as she couldn’t imagine having to face Maiya again, but it was a red-haired girl wearing a foreign dress of beads and animal furs that they released.
“Sora, Yuming. Yuming, Sora,” Nagako whispered quickly. Yuming nodded curtly as she rubbed her sore wrists. The next prisoner they released was Maiya.
“I’m going to kill you, Imperium brat.”
“Whoa. Maiya.” Yuming caught her quickly as Maiya reached for Sora with her bloody fingertips and scraped knuckles. “Let’s just get out of here.”
“You all go,” ordered Nagako softly. “I’m staying here. The Imperium is a valuable partner in trade for the Crossroads.”
“Wait. There’s one more of us. I’m not leaving without Jade.”
“I’m working on finding Jade. Jade isn’t being held here. Go. Their security cameras are coming back online, soon. The hovership moving from cargo bay eleven is headed to the Crossroads in half an hour. Hitch a ride. My girls will meet you when you arrive.”
Nagako turned back and left them no choice but to move forward. Yuming stood between Maiya and Sora as the ex-servant of the Imperium was certain she was considering every possible way to wrestle the gun from her and give her what she deserved.
“Cargo bay 11. Where the hell is that?” Yuming whispered as she herded her two companions in the opposite direction that Nagako went.
“I know,” Sora said. She picked up their pace as they rounded the corner.
“How do I know I can trust you?” challenged Maiya.
“I-“
“Maiya!” Yuming smacked her lightly on the arm. Maiya recoiled from the gentle hit and hissed as she held her arm as if she had been shot.
“I’m sorry,” said Sora. Maiya glared. Both of them knew it wasn’t enough.
“Let’s keep moving.” Yuming directed them onwards. They rushed when Sora moved them quickly across open spaces and ducked cautiously around corners when she urged care.
“Cargo bay 11. This is it,” Sora whispered. The three ducked into the shadows as the Imperium guard passed. Cargo bay workers milled around within the room. She frowned as she turned back towards her companions.
“That was easier than I expected,” whispered Maiya. Sora shook her head.
“Exactly,” she said, “that was too easy.”
Yuming’s eyes widened as she stared over Sora’s head. She shoved the girl and her dragon to the side, but the Imperium Guard behind them moved faster.
