“It’s just like getting your ears pierced, my ass,” my sister, Destiny, grumbled, her hand covering her neck where the NPU had just been inserted by the biggest needle I’d ever seen go into a conscious person. “Thathurt.”
She paced the room, as if the pain would go away by walking it off. Her shoulder-length purple hair swayed as she moved.
“Stop whining. I went first.” I wasn’t about to let my sisters see exactly how nervous I was. As the oldest, I had to keep my shit together. No matter how terrifying the last twenty-four hours had been, I had a feeling the next twenty-four were going to be far worse. “With all those tattoos up and down your spine”—the markings were elaborate, feminine, and very beautiful, but I’d never admit that to her—"you should be used to the tiny little poke of a needle.”
Destiny rolled her eyes, still rubbing the area behind her ear. “That wasn’t a normal needle. That’s a knitting needle shooting tiny bullets into our brains.”
Warden Egara, the official representative of the Coalition Fleet at the bride processing center, was from Earth herself, but didn’t appear to have much of a sense of humor today. “The NPU doesn’t go into your brain, ladies. The nanotech burrows into the temporal bone surrounding the cochlea and transmits modified sounds directly to the cochlear nerve. And you’ll all be very thankful when you can understand anyone you come across.” She was efficiency personified. Crisp uniform, sleek dark hair, easy-going, yet serious demeanor. And all that science talk? Not my thing, but Faith was nodding with a fascinated look on her face.
Science geek. Faith had been bringing hurt animals and even insects home since she could walk. For all that, she had a gentle spirit that neither Destiny nor I could claim. I liked order. The rule of law. Tradition. Faith never made plans. And Destiny? Well, my baby sister pretty much walked around beating up bullies and making sure shit got done. Together, we were strong. I just hoped we were strong enough to survive the next few weeks. Hell, years. We were going home to a planet none of us had ever seen. And we were hunting for enemies we didn’t know.
The whole thing was a giant cluster-fuck, and I wished I’d listened to Mother two years ago when she suggested we return to Alera. But I’d been in law school. Too busy. Always too busy.
Now she was gone, and it was my fault.
“Stop being a baby or you’ll scare Faith,” I said. The injectionhad hurt, but since I’d gone first, I’d bit my lip and stifled my gasp at the sharp pain. Really, there should be a numbing solution, or some kind of drug for this.
“Just because I like to dress like a girl doesn’t mean I’m not tougher than both of you.” My middle sister, Faith, was eight minutes older than her twin. Both of them were almost three years younger than my twenty-seven. They were my half-sisters, but their human father wasn’t the reason we were all here—getting ready to transport to another world sight unseen.
Faith took a deep breath, let it out, as Warden Egara prepared the wicked looking tool for her turn. Itwas like an ear-piercing gun, but with a needle meant for an amniocentesis or alien probing inste
