Mal was on guard for the next few days, but he relaxed when he realized Fenrir wasn't interested in reporting him to their superiors. He hadn't left the walls of the city in the time, but he sometimes found higher and excluded elevated ground to connect the COMMS device X'eno had handed him. He didn't know the details of how it worked. All he knew was that the Nok metal tower structure was responsible for why he could listen to voices on the little device.

"Who's this? What's your position and assignment?" A voice said in Nok that got clearer as Mal turned the dial on the device.

Mal responded back in Nok. "I was looking for X'eno Crest." There was silence on the other end, and then a sign.

"Try this dial. I'm not in camp," the person on the other end said, giving Mal a number sequence that he tried his best to match as closely as possible on the dial. Everyone with a device in the area knew him by now. He would connect to any radio signal like X'eno told him, and if the person was nice enough, they'd pass the device over to X'eno or try to get him on a valid network.

There was a bleep sound when the device disconnected from the first person and put him through to a woman this time. He recognized her. She was part of the camp X'eno lived in.

"I'll patch you to him," the woman said, and soon X'eno was on the other end, muttering about his scouting duties and the weird ship that had been making an appearance.

"You're seeing it too?" Mal asked, referencing the ship. It was a ship, but ships were rare now on the planet. After the war and all the recouping, the only faction rich enough to maintain any sustainable fleet was the Queen Matron's. Her faction was closer to the other side of the continent, so having a plane fly several times over Toban territory, and low enough to cause a blackout in the sky was disturbing.

"We see glimpses. Our navigator thinks it's a surveyor ship. A faction might be scoping the location," X'eno said.

"Why?" Mal asked, feeling nervous. He bent down, balancing on his knees as he stared over the walls. "You don't sound worried."

"Nok try not to kill each other anymore," X'eno said. "And I think you're safe. It's suicide to go after Tobans with Magi in their presence. They're probably just doing scans to build maps."

"I see," Mal said, feeling the worry build up in the pit of his stomach. He wanted to probe X'eno for more information but opted to not be annoying instead.

"How are you?"

X'eno's question made Mal blink. He didn't realize he'd been silent for a little too long.

"I'm okay." Mal's voice was small. He sat down on the floor, folding his hands over his knees. "I'm going crazy in here, though."

"You said you couldn't leave the city walls," X'eno recalled. "You still haven't told me the details."

"I had a disagreement with a superior," Mal said, squinting into the distance like it would be enough to spot X'eno in his camp through the marsh of trees. He didn't want to talk about Fenrir, and he especially didn't want to talk about all the courting nonsense. He wasn't sure why it made him uncomfortable. He knew X'eno would understand. He wasn't the type to get upset. If anything, he was the one who'd been deeply worried about their relationship not working out because of the species difference. Having Mal repeat the things Fenrir said wouldn't upset him. He would think some of them were even partly correct.

"Was it because you were late last time?" X'eno asked.

"Partly." Mal's voice was small. The grass blades caressed his thighs, and soon he was fiddling with a piece of grass between his fingers. He remembered his mum loving grass. It was common to prep meals with them in the Toban section of the protectorate city he'd lived in until his mid-teens. He remembered food like that making him sick. He didn't have the tough Toban dental pads at the back of his mouth or the two stomach system to handle it. Roots and bark from sap trees were a big part of his mother's diet, and even when his father became more involved in their finances, his mother still enjoyed that kind of food. It was something she only stopped having when they'd moved to Toba.

It was poor people food.

And Tobans rejected their subjugated past even though it was part of their diet before that.

"When do you think you can leave the gates again? I'd like to bring you to camp. It's been a while," X'eno said. "Y'ena said she would like to fortify your blade if you'd let her."

Mal chuckled a bit. Fortifying weapons to the Nok mostly just meant increasing the zark purity. "If she wants, she can," Mal said, remembering the last time he'd been at the camp. He was more comfortable with the texture of Nok food, so he'd enjoyed that aspect of heading to X'eno's camp the most. They ate mostly meat, grains that were turned into sweet pastes and flaky bars, and plants that had to be grown in artificial conditions since they were foreign to the planet and had come with the Nok on their initial landing.

"I can meet up with you tomorrow evening," Mal mumbled into the radio, listening for X'eno's voice.

"I'll meet you at the cliff," the scout said on the other end.

"Okay," Mal said. He was still getting used to talking on the radio. Most times he would nod or smile, forgetting to say words since X'eno couldn't see him.

"I'll let you go now. See you tomorrow. I'll be there at sundown." The radio made a clicking sound and soon Mal was listening to static. He put the COMMS device away, before looking out into the marsh of trees, knowing that X'eno was out there somewhere.

***

"Dilute, give me a hand." The voice was feminine and soft, and although calling him that, was friendly. Mal nodded, locking eyes with Sage. She was another youth doing military training, but she was a little younger than him. They were in the middle of a training drill where they were supposed to pair up with partners to practice their aiming and stances.

Sage was a mana tapper — her strong point being wielding flame. Her skin was ash black, and her features were only distinct because of the white tattoos arched into her brow ride, lips, and cheeks.

"What do you need me to do?" Mal asked, piercing the red dirt with the end of his staff.

"Dodge," the woman said painfully, smiling as the peddles she juggled in her hands lit up with flames. She threw them — slow enough for Mal to react without getting hurt, but fast enough for him to be surprised. He deflected them with his staff, going into a stance when the last of them was launched out of the way.

"What have you been up to these days?" Sage asked, igniting another set of rocks. They didn't see each other often since Sage trained with the Magi, and Mal with the weapons specialists, but once in a while joined drills were held and they got to catch up.

"Nothing out of the ordinary, yourself?" Mal asked, spinning his staff as Sage pelted him with another set of pebbles.

"I attended the waking. I'm happy for him," Sage said, referring to the new mage. "He was under there for over a week. I was afraid he wouldn't make it."

"I'm glad he survived," Mal said, more to himself than anything. He remembered being sixteen and walking out to the town square to be greeted by the death of someone doing their waking. Their hands had been burned to crisps from the attempts to escape the metal chains that wrapped them around the pole at the center of the square. He had remembered the muttering from adults, and the wailing of a mate left behind too soon.

"Why didn't you come?" Sage asked.

"I had something else to do," Mal said. He got along with Sage, but she was intensely Toban — even more than Fenrir. She venerated Iriro and was the mountain steep. To her, magi couldn't do any wrong, and the council had the best interests of everyone. He'd made the mistake of arguing with her once. She wasn't as sweet as she was when she was parroting government talking points. Regardless, she wasn't wary of dilutes and supported council members who were pro-return for anyone with Toban lineage.

"Were you outside again?" she asked, "Was It X'eno? Are you two still friends?"

Mal sucked in his cheeks, nodding. "Yes," he said, shaking the tendril that had gotten in front of his face. "We're supposed to meet again tomorrow night."

Sage knew about X'eno but she didn't know they were mates. She wouldn't understand if she did — or approve, and Mal didn't want to lose one of the few people at the outpost who didn't look at him like he shouldn't exist. The short woman nodded, seeming to take in the information before squatting to pick up the two spears she'd laid down on the floor hours ago.

"I'm fascinated that you could befriend one." 'One' being a Nok. "I — well, I guess I shouldn't surprised because of your upbringing."

Mal's mouth opened like he was about to say something before the sound of the reverberating alarm drums went off. There was soon a sea of murmuring as the clouds grew dark. Mal and Sage looked up at the sky. The vessel from the morning loomed the closest it had ever been to the ground, almost grazing the roofs of their habitats. It stayed like that for several minutes before flying away and leaving behind a whirlwind of air and dust.

"That's the fourth time today," Payne — the drill sergeant — said, stepping through the crowd. Mal felt his stomach drop when he realized she was approaching him. Her blue tendrils hung over her shoulder and stopped at the start of her waist.

"Remember when I asked you if you knew anything about this, this afternoon?" Payne asked, and Mal nodded, remembering her stopping him on his way back to his room. "I gathered you don't know what's happening, but what do you think is happening"

Her voice drew further attention towards him and soon every instructor, solider and trainee had their eyes on him.

Mal felt the blood drain from his face. He hated being put on the spot. "I told you I don't know."

"You've lived with them. Give me an idea of what that vessel could be," the sergeant said, "don't be coy with me."

"You shouldn't talk to him like that," Tark said, making his way through the crowd until he was in the center with them. "He grew up in a protectorate. Ships are few and far between outside of Matron's faction. He probably hasn't seen one in person until today. You're acting like he's flying the craft himself."

"He might as well be," someone in the crowd said. "Who's to say he's not their inside contact?"

The murmuring in the crowd intensified, their emotions starting to reach into Mal in a way he couldn't avoid. The swarm of doubt, fear, and suspicion overwhelmed him. Their thoughts permeated his mind, echoing their reservations.

I don't trust him.

He looks too much like them.

His eyes are dead like theirs. I hate that ice blue.

"Enough," Payne said, trying to subdue the crowd that she'd formed. She looked from one corner to the other until the voices died down, before turning her attention back to Mal. "Answer my question, dilute."

"I—" Mal started, unsure what to say. The weight of the whispers in his head was giving him a migraine. He wished he could disappear and lie down until he could hear nothing. "I only know what the vessel is."

Payne's face softened. "Go on."

"It's a surveyor craft. It's used to scan territory to build real-time 3D maps," Mal said.

Payne signed. "Explain that again."

"It's used to draw maps for traveling," Mal said, and Payne seemed to understand that. He watched her blue-black eyes for any sign of what she was thinking.

"Why would they want a map of here?" Payne asked.

"To update databases," Mal offered. "Traveling and navigating the area. Having a lot at the area to see what the resource deposits are like, and see if it's worth coming here—"

"Or worth colonizing here," Payne added. "So we're being spied on. Why didn't you bring this up before?"

"I didn't think it was anything of great importance. Mercenaries do scans for their maps but on a much smaller scale," Mal said, looking at the floor now.

"Who's responsible?"

"Tark's guess is my guess," Mal said, taking a deep breath as he blinked back and tried to force everyone's thoughts out of his head. "Only the Matron has the recourses to keep vessels in the air."

"The matron's at the other end of the continent," Payne said, reaching out to grab Mal's shoulder. Her grip was painful, digging her black nails into his skin. "Is this a joke? Why would she care about our outpost?"

"I don't know," Mal said, and Payne released him, covering her face with her hand.

"What makes sense here? A Matron interested in our tiny outpost here, or the mercenaries just north of us getting new equipment?" Payne asked. "It could be a job. They're just mercenaries. It doesn't matter if we've traded with their company for years."

"No!" The weight of Mal's voice shocked Payne and everyone around her. He noticed the intense looks he was getting before taking a deep breath. "It's not them."

"How are you so sure about that?"

Mal blinked, trying to look for an excuse, but he couldn't think of one. "I just know. Only the Matron has this level of technology at her disposal."

"And the matron can hire mercenaries..." Payne said, observing the look in Mal's eyes. "Mal, don't take this the wrong way, but we need you under arrest while everything's sorted out—"

"What?" He knew everyone was wary of him, but to imprison him...?

"Fenrir, see to it, please," the sergeant said, giving Mal an apologetic look before turning and walking away. Fenrir, who had been standing at the edge of the crowd, motioned for two soldiers to approach Mal. Mal stepped back a bit, only stopping when he bumped into Sage. She reached out, holding on to his hand and squeezing it before he was pulled from her and restrained with handcuffs.

"What just happened?"

Sage's voice was the last thing he heard in the distance, before being hurled away from the crowd and towards the prison quarters.