“And you all are sacred. All the people are sacred, on the colonized planets, on the Home Planet, all the enslaved people everywhere.” I am talking to a group of people in Savela, trying to teach them that it’s us, the people in chains, the people under the boot of the Empire, it’s those people who are holy. It’s us who are holy. Not the Empire. Never the Empire. I am surrounded by my people. And we’re holy. So holy. 

“And how will we tell each other that?” a teenaged girl asks me, “how will we teach people?”

“Treat everyone like they’re sacred,” I reply, “Treat people like the glory they are and they will understand that they’re glorious, that all of us are glorious.”

A banging booms through the room, coming from the door. All of our eyes go wide. 

“Open the door!” A rough voice commands. “Open the door or we’ll break it down for you!”

I rise, and make my way to the rickety little door, the only protection between us and the Imperial guard. I take a deep breath and pull it open, and am met face-to-face with the Prince and his crew, dressed in thick, heat-generating armour. Something really disastrous must have happened for him to be here. Why is he here?

“We’re here for an Savelian woman named Ikkia. We were lead to believe she is in this area.” The Prince’s voice is harsh, full of hatred. His eyes are cold and hard, glinting blue like shadows on steel. I can’t breathe as all my past comes rushing up to me. I feel so young. So young. So lost. 

But I remember all the people crowded into the room behind me. The people, the pouring infinities, who are depending on me to keep them safe, to keep all of our collective future safe. They need me. Not in the way that the Prince and his family need me but rather in an altogether different, more beautiful way. They’re depending on me and I have power. I have power. Even if it’s minuscule, even here in the face of the Imperial guards, I do have power. 

I swallow down my terror and I do what I’ve had to do all my life. I act. Except this time, I’m doing it not just to save myself but also to save all my people. 

“It’s me. I’m her,” I lie. It’s not really a lie, though, but it is. 

“You are under arrest for crimes against the Empire!” the redheaded friend declares. 

I think briefly that I could use magic to get myself out of this situation. I have magic that I can use now. Magic that is my own. Or, ours. But no. Of course not. If I use magic in front of them, we’re all dead. If there’s any hint that magic is going on, they’ll destroy us. We’ll lose the one chance that we have. I can’t use magic. And I’m so glad that I caught myself before I did anything stupid. 

“Do I come with you, then?” I ask as meekly as I can manage. The most important thing right now is getting away from this hut full of people, this hut with children and babies in it, this neighbourhood full of people, this neighbourhood full of children and babies. I know what the Prince is like. I know what his friends are like. I know the explosive anger that is always squatting in their hearts, ready to be unleashed upon everyone that they hate. 

“Come with us, you wench,” the Prince’s girlfriend - or maybe she’s his wife now? - states in a cold, hard, sharp tone. It’s a tone I’m far too familiar with. It takes everything inside me to not wince at her words. 

“Ikkia! Don’t go!” a young child named Kamara calls out after me, “We need you!” Her voice is full of sweetness, of childishness, of worry and concern. My heart thuds in fear. She’s too young to incur the wrath of the Empire. Far too young. Though, I was much younger than her when I first incurred the wrath of the Empire. 

“It’s okay,” I tell her. I put as much assurance into my voice as I can. I hope she doesn’t see through the lie. “I’ll be okay. Let me go with them. Don’t fight them.”

“But Ikkia,” a little boy, Kikonon, asservates, “we need you. And you need to be safe!”

“I will be safe,” I lie, looking at all the people, pouring kindness over my voice, “I will be safe. Just let me go.” 

“That’s enough of this show,” the light brown-haired friend declares. He grabs me hard by the wrist, so hard that it hurts, and he pulls me out of the door. I try not to cry out in pain as I am roughly dragged through the streets. They pace out in front of me. Not even looking back my way. I turn around once, get one last look at the people I am leaving behind. Then I turn back around and prepare to face my destiny. Fear floods my mind. I have displeased the Prince. I have displeased the Prince. I have displeased the Prince. But still. Still. 

There is something incredibly satisfying about having displeased the Prince. There is something deeply victorious about it. Though I try not to let the satisfaction show on my face. That would get us all killed. 

We are rushing through the streets of the neighbourhood when suddenly I am thrown onto the ground. I hit the cold ice with a thud, and it sends chills all throughout my freezing body. I was already freezing before, in the chilly air of Savela, but now as I hit the ice, I am burning with cold. But of course they don’t care. Before I can react, a heavy boot slams down over my cheek, staying there, holding me in place. 

“Don’t move, you maggot!” The blonde friend screams. The shoe grinds down further on my cheek. I don’t move. I couldn’t move if I wanted to. And my fear is calling out to me to stay in place. But still. Still. It is so very deeply humiliating to be crushed into the ground like this, as if I am a bug to be squashed. But I have experience facing humiliation. The Empire and its rulers love humiliating the people that they think of as lesser beings. 

I think of all the people that I have met in my many years of journeying throughout the lands. And it sends a wave of pride through me. Yet the pride does not take away the humiliation. They both live side-by-side, against each other, rubbing together. And from the places where they rub against each other, where they create friction, where they rub each other raw, a new emotion takes shape and blooms within my being. Sweet, warm, dark resentment. An emotion I am far too familiar with. 

All at once there are knees falling hard onto my back, feet slamming down over my legs. I cry out in pain. It hurts so much. So much. As if I have been battered by a boulder. The pain is uncomfortably warm, dull yet piercing at the same time, reverberating from its molten centres out to all the different parts of me. It doesn’t hurt nearly as much as the magic extraction machines. But I can tell that my body will be coloured red in bruises and swelling because of this. 

My arms are twisted harshly and wrenched back, my joints crying out in pain. Cold metal is locked around my wrists, cold metal is locked around my ankles, and cold metal is locked around my neck. The bindings around my wrists and the bindings around my neck are both just slightly too tight to be comfortable. But still, what’s far worse than that is the humiliation. I am chained like a dog, all because I stood up for the pride of my people. I am chained like an animal. 

But I know, I know that no matter what they do they cannot take the sacred glory that is in my soul. That is my soul, that is the souls of all the enslaved and colonized people all throughout the whole galaxy. 

The Imperials grab the collar around my neck and forcefully pull me to my feet. I stumble a few times as I try to get up, their pulling hands and my own shackles making the task hard. Each time I stumble I am punched back into the ground and I have to start the process of getting up all over again. But finally, I do manage to stand. And all around me the Prince and his goons jeer at me, insulting me for being so pathetic. 

It’s not like I care. Except I do care. But I keep that to myself. I keep silent no matter what they say, not meeting them in the eyes. I don’t want to meet them in the eyes because I don’t want to incur their wrath when we are still so deep in the city. Not when there are huts filled with people all around us. Not when there are civilians all around us. And also, I do not meet them in the eyes because I don’t want them to see the hurt that is in my own eyes, nor the smouldering rage. 

Not that they would see them anyways, though. They never notice the emotions of those they call monsters. They don’t think we have emotions. But still. Still. I know beyond doubt now that we are not monsters. I know beyond doubt that we are, that my people are people, are sacred, are beautiful. And it’s the Imperials with all of their greed and elitism and superiority and hunger for wealth and power that are the real monsters. It’s them that are the truly brutal people. 

The chain around my neck is yanked and I am pulled forwards again, a brisk pace that is it difficult for me to keep up in my under-protected, freezing body. 

“Hurry up, you wench!” the Prince’s dark brown-haired friend shouts, “I know you can go faster than this, you pathetic thing! We don’t have all the day!”

“Sorry,” I reply, and I try to walk faster. And I do walk faster. I do. But just when I speed my gait, the Imperials ahead of me speed up even more, pulling on the chain that is attached to my collar. 

“If you don’t keep up with us,” the Prince’s girlfriend booms, “we will have no choice but to beat you into the ground where you belong. You better listen to us if you know what’s good for you!”

“Sorry, ma’am,” I speak, as submissively as I can. 

“That’s sorry, your Highness, you pathetic sop!” she yells back at me. So they did get married, the Prince and his girlfriend. Good for them I guess. Though I don’t feel happy for them at all. The happiness of the Imperials means nothing at all to me. 

“Okay, your highness,” I reply, “I’m sorry.” I almost run in order to keep up with them. But keep up with them I do, I manage to, I barely manage to do it. And for that I am grateful. 

All this whole while though, I am absolutely terrified. The sense of dread that washes over me, that drowns me, it’s far greater than any fear that I have felt before. I am choking on it. I am gagging on it. It seeps down, too hot and too cold at the same time, terrifying, terrible. It seeps down through every part of me and I cannot breathe. My mind is blaring, like there are thousands of alarm bells going off at once, and it’s too loud, too loud, too loud. My heart it thudding faster than it ever has before, so fast that my whole chest feels like a roiling mess of dirty water. 

Why did they arrest me? Why did they arrest me? What do they know about me, about my mission? What do they know about what I’ve been doing so far? About the people I’ve been working with so far? Do they know about the World Stones? Do they know about the void? Do they know about how I’ve been travelling, who I’ve been talking with? Because if they do know about all of that, if they do know all of that, then I am completely screwed. Not only that, all my people are completely screwed. Our whole plan is completely screwed. Our chance at freedom. 

I wonder if they’re going to torture me. I bet they are. But if they torture me, I can’t say anything, I can’t give anything away. I wonder if I’ll be able to do that. Not even the best of the best can hold up against torture. The best that I try will probably not be enough. And if it’s not enough, who knows what questions they’ll ask me. Maybe they’ll ask about the World Stones. Maybe they’ll ask about how I’ve been travelling. Then what will I say? 

But still. Still. I’ve kept myself secret and hidden, kept myself quiet and contained, through all kinds of immense, incredible pressure, ever since I was a tiny, young child. I’ve been keeping myself hidden through emotional pain that was a thousand times worse than any physical pain of any type could ever be. I’ve been tortured. I’ve been tortured and I’ve been tortured and still I’ve kept quiet, still I’ve had to keep quiet. The odds therefore are at least somewhat in my favour. I have a chance, maybe, as tiny as the chance might be, and I can use that fact to my advantage. 

We get to a large field that is covered in snow. Through the blur of falling snow, I can see the large spacecraft sitting squat against the whiteness all around. It is a shining, effervescent multi-coloured metallic thing. All sharp angles and sleek sides and curved walls. Impressive, like everything that comes from the Empire’s Home Planet. I am all too familiar with this kind of spaceship. I know what it entails for me. 

I’m going back to where I came from. After all these years.

I gulp down my horror. I have to act like I don’t know what’s happening. I have to act like I don’t know what this is. So I keep my eyes up at the spaceship. And I look at it as if I have never seen something so grand in my life. As if under all the dread, I am a little bit amazed. Though, in all honesty, I don’t think that anyone from the colonized planets would be amazed to see such a spaceship. I think they would be scornful at all the money wasted, money that could go towards feeding people instead. 

“Stop gawking and come along,” the Princess states unceremoniously. 

I have two paths in front of me now. I could go on pretending like I’m the meek, submissive slave that I’ve been being before or I can, out here far away from anyone, pretend like I am rebellious. It would make sense to be rebellious. Because I’m sure they’re expecting some kind of rebel leader, and I don’t want to remind them of the scared child that I used to be. 

But at the same time, if I switch out people, pretend to be someone else, they might suspect that I’ve been acting back in the community, when they were near the people. If they suspect that I’ve been acting, then they will suspect that I’m clever, more clever than I’ve let on. And I can’t have them think that I am hiding anything. I can’t have them looking too deeply into my behaviour. Because if they think I’m hiding something, they might prod deeper than I’m able to bury my secrets.