Page 62 of Claimed By the Alien Assassin
Between the puddles of dark blood and the blackened torch stains, I realize the final blow was never against Kernal—it was against a dream. The illusion. The hope that we could win and keep our clean hearts. Now every colonist views me as a monster; a savior who kills without mercy.
I close my eyes—taste copper blood at the edges. “I’m... sorry,” I whisper. Not for killing Kernal, but for what I became.
Josie steps closer, pressing her body into mine; her voice is quiet, redemptive: “I don’t care what they think.” Her lips graze my ear. “And neither do I.”
I inhale her—sweat, torch-smoke, fierce warmth. “We needed to win.”
She smiles, fragile and feral. “And we did.”
Her faith hums through me. But still: the colonists recoil. We backed them to safety, yes—but they see the beast who built it.
Night whistles from the treetops. The survivors gather to tend wounds, clamp bleeding, salvage bodies. The field is littered with jagged rib-cages of water pipes and fractured tools—a mosaic of survival and cost. We helped them stand—but now they stare at us as foreign gods.
I drop to one knee by Kernal’s side, pressing a hand to the pulse that’s gone. No humanity. Only a corpse. My claw-nails tint red. I close my fist.
I stand slowly and uncover a hand over the fallen commander’s face—the last flicker of power reduced to stillness.
I whisper: “You’re gone.”
Josie wraps her arms around me, her voice steady: “And you’re not.”
I let her hold me. My chest heaves, each breath a vow—not to the victory, but to what it cost.
In the forest-edge night, smoke and heat still rise from sabotage fires. The golden embers of the capital ship sparkle above. Dawn cannot come soon enough.
But as long as the colonists see fear in my eyes, I know—they’re not free yet.
And neither am I.
CHAPTER 16
JOSIE
The morning air presses on my skin like a benediction—warm, humid, scented with damp earth and the first flush of rainforest blossoms. For the first time in weeks, Snowblossom breathes. I pause at the cluster of rebuilt prefab huts along the perimeter, my fingers tracing the rough kiss of plaster and patched polish where we once stockpiled weapons and supplies. The smell of fresh pineboards mingles with high-altitude ozone—it’s surreal, as though we’ve awakened from a nightmare into a dream we didn’t imagine was real.
Laughter—pure and trebly—drifts across the breeze. Kids run ahead of me, two little engineers draped in patched bomber jackets trailing homemade kites fashioned from migrant sheets and covert communications paper. Their kites wobbled in the sky like stubborn birds, dancing in loops of freedom. I smile; the cuteness strikes me like a jolt—a reminder of what we fought to resurrect.
My boots crunch over reclaimed stones and shattered paneling. I come upon Jonas, a miner who lost his brother in the early days of the occupation, hammering nails into a sturdy frame that will become a proper home. Sweat drips down hisgrimy face, but his eyes—so utterly alive—lock with mine as I approach.
“Morning, Josie,” he says, voice warm like reclaimed sunshine. “Made it.”
I nod, feeling something sort through my chest. “Aye, Jonas. And so did you.”
He smiles and returns to his work. A child behind him adjusts a wireline at the roof’s peak. I inhale—sawdust and fresh blood from the repair site—tiny sacrifices of this new dawn.
I move further along the perimeter, visiting the gun turret that once rumbled with ammunition. Its barrel is bent, charred by Vortaxian energy blasts. A team of engineers patches joints, fitting new servos and reinforcing the base with reclaimed alloys. I crouch beside them, whispering technical praise as I smooth a weld, fix a loose sensor, test a manual override. It’s routine—mundane even—but it feels miraculous. We’re teaching our people to defend and rebuild with the same hands. There’s power in that.
Across from the turret, farmers have uprooted prefab containers, transforming them into community gardens. Tomato vines dip in raindrops. Beans hang by twisted wires. I kneel, the soil cool under my palms. Rich and hungry. I plant a seedling beside a makeshift trellis, silent as a prayer: this colony will blossom again.
A voice calls: “Engineer McClintock!” I turn to see Tara—the seamstress who rigged uniforms in the dark during occupation—arriving with her daughter, a wide-eyed girl holding a handful of daisies. She presses them into my palm. Their petals are soft and trembling, alive. My throat tightens. I tuck them into my belt beside the torch lighter.
“Thank you,” I say, voice catching. “They’re beautiful.”
She smiles, mother-proud. “Just like you.”
I leave her to her seedlings and continue my walk, breath pulling in the promise of every rising nail, every retrained arm. Every reclaimed space. Every repaired dream.
The air begins to bloom with midday heat. A breeze rustles the creeping vines wrapped around repurposed rails. The sound is a lullaby, not a warning. A child runs past me, pressing a toy drone against my hand—olds from the resistance. He looks up, eyes bright. “Test flight?” he asks.
