The Princess and the Human

After drawing a deep breath, Githaiy raised her hand and knocked on the door in front of her.

"Yes?" came a calm answer from inside. A way too calm answer considering the situation. Slowly, she opened. Remembering what Nadine had done to her chair, the doctor half-expected to find most of the items in the room to be destroyed. But that wasn't the case. Everything was as clean and tidy as it always was.

The small alien was sitting at her desk in front of an open package. And she was wearing... gloves?

"Osiyn sent in the first prototypes," she explained, seemingly having noticed her stare. "He made a couple out of a few different materials and wanted me to test them."

Prototypes? And who was Osiyn? Githaiy somehow felt like she had missed something.

"I don't know if they actually do what they are supposed to. But just wearing them feels... good. I feel less afraid to be near others. Which is good, because I'll need to interact with others if I want to find the truth. I will do whatever I can to keep the promise I made last night."

Even while she said all of this, her voice remained completely calm. But not her usual kind of calm. Githaiy couldn't really describe it, but Nadine's face was still wearing the same expression as last night. The same expression as when she had started to hunt down the Kiroscha. And if Githaiy had to put in words how Nadine's voice sounded right now, she would probably say it sounded like her face looked right now.

And while the doctor wasn't really sure what to make of it, her body absolutely was: every single instinct she had screamed at her to run away and bring herself to safety. Had she not known Nadine by now, she was not fully convinced that she would have been able to fight those instincts. Even now, she wasn't able to stop herself from flinching when the small alien moved - even though all she did was close the box.

"A-actually, that won't be necessary. The Guards already found the culprit."

And those words left Githaiys mouth, Nadine's eyes grew big in surprise. And just like that, the feeling of dread that radiated from her vanished, as if it had never been there. Sitting in the chair in front of the doctor was merely the same Nadine as she knew her.

"Who was it?"

"One of the maids who were called in from the Sun Palace to help." She pulled out her datapad and opened the report the guard captain had given her. "Yesterday morning, she didn't appear to work, but was sighted in the Star Palace - by that point, her absence hadn't been reported yet - and then, she was found last night by the guards in the outskirts of Calhanar."

Nadine listened carefully. After she was finished, the alien's gaze wandered to the floor.

"I... see. Good to know. Do you know her motive?"

Githaiy didn't answer immediately. Should she tell her? She wasn't directly involved and, considering what she had already been through, it probably wouldn't...

"It has something to do with me, doesn't it?"

"Huh? W-what makes you think that?"

"If it didn't you wouldn't have hesitated."

First Ones, was she really that easy to read? Well, no point in trying to hide it now.

"Her partner was among the guards on the Star Treader. He died during the Kiroscha attack and..." She peeked at her datapad to look at the name. "... Kaiyla blamed Her Highness for it, stating that he wouldn't have died if she hadn't changed course."

"How much about the event is known?"

"Everything, except the reason for leaving the secure routes."

"In other words, me."

"Yes."

After that, there was a long pause. Nadine just said there in silence, and Githaiy didn't interrupt her. She had originally planned to not tell her the assassin's motive, but unfortunately, she had underestimated the girl's wit.

"Um, doc?" she finally spoke again.

"Yes?"

"How old are you?"

Well, that question came out of nowhere.

Githaiy considered for just a moment to be vague about it, but in the end, she decided that there was no point. If she asked, then she probably knew.

"Sixteen cycles."

"So... about ten years. It's true then."

Githaiy nodded, not needing to ask what she meant.

"I'm sorry for not telling you. It's not like we were trying to hide it, there simply never was a good moment to talk about it. Frankly, I still have trouble processing it. No sapient lifeform known to us comes even close to your lifespan."

To that, the small alien gave off a dry laugh.

"From your perspective, I really am some immortal, unkillable monster, huh."

Githaiy flinched. No, Nadine was just about to get better, she couldn't allow her thoughts to go there again.

"Nadine, you aren't-"

"Of course I am," she interrupted her with a bitter voice. "I can break your arms without even trying, I can dissolve you by merely touching you, I don't even want to know what I could do if I actually wanted to harm you... and now I learn that all of you will be dead by the time I turn thirty! Except maybe Kiyrtin, but even he will be a doddery old man at that- oh my gosh, Kiyrtin! I... I robbed him of his entire childhood, didn't I?!"

Githaiy just listened to her lament, primarily because she didn't know what to say. She couldn't exactly refute Nadine's points. To a being that could grow so old, their lives probably were unimaginably short. Maybe it was best to just switch topics.

"W-well, for now, let's just be glad that Her Highness is safe, right? She is stable, and the assassin was caught!"

The small alien gave off a sigh.

"I guess. Say, doc, where is that maid now?"

"Um, probably in the morgue."

"Oh, was she killed during the chase? They didn't already execute her, did they?"

'Yes, after her confession she was immediately executed.' That would have been the easy thing to say. And believable, because, had she still been alive and had His or Her Majesty learned what she had done, that was exactly what would have happened. It would have been a convenient lie, but a lie nonetheless. Even if her silence wouldn't have already been answer enough for the alien girl.

"She committed suicide, didn't she."

Was she really that obvious? Or was that a human thing?

"Answer me, Doc."

"... yes. In her confession note, she wrote that she couldn't bear living without her partner."

Another moment of silence followed. Then Nadine took a breath so deep it almost felt like she exchanged the air in the entire room.

"Can I see her?"

See who? She couldn't be talking about the corpse, could she?

"Are you sure that is a good idea?"

"No. But it feels like something I should do."

Githaiy sighed internally.

"It can be arranged. But I won't be able to accompany you. I need to watch over Her Highness, not to mention that I really need to catch up on sleep, so I have to make sure all the monitoring devices work as intended."

To that, Nadine did that strange contortion with her face during which she seemed to push up the skin above one of her eyes. Seriously, how many muscles did her face have?

"Why not call in more doctors?"

"Because that would be against the emergency protocol. Should Her Highness get incapacitated, until she regains consciousness, no one is to be informed except the absolute minimum amount of people necessary to ensure her survival."

"What kind of suicidal protocol is that?!"

"One that is meant to prevent the King and Queen from finding out about it without Her Highness being able to perform damage control."

To that, the small alien simply gave her a blank stare.

"Do not worry. I guarantee you that I will call more people in the moment I see even the slightest possibility of it making a difference."

Kessga was angry. More than he had ever been in his life.

He was angry at the maid who had almost killed Her Highness. So what if she was sad that her partner had died? Guards occasionally died on duty, that was part of the job. And yet, she attempted regicide for no other reason than him doing his job? Giving his life so the one he'd sworn to protect could live? Unbelievable that someone like this had been employed under His and Her Majesty themselves.

He was angry at the staff of the palace. One single person had been able to almost kill the princess without any of them noticing anything.

And more than all of the others combined, he was angry at himself. He was the newly appointed captain of the Star Palace's guards! He was the one tasked with ensuring the princess's safety! He was responsible for managing the security so that nothing could happen! Above all the others, he was the one who had failed his duty.

The moment he got the call from the city guard who had found the maid's corpse he had issued the alert, but at that time, it was already too late. Had it not been for Lady Nadine, Her Highness would now be dead.

The alien noblewoman was currently walking next to him as he led her through the halls of the morgue, following her request to see the culprit. He had no idea why she would want that, but after the service she had done to their kingdom, who was he to question her?

Kessga hadn't interacted much with her. He knew that she was a noble from a so far uncontacted species and that her existence was to be kept a secret for now, but that was about it. Although he had heard the servants talk very positively about her.

"This is it," the guard captain said as he opened the door. The alien noblewoman closed her eyes and took a deep breath, then she followed him in.

The body was held in an environment that would prevent decay. There was no damage to it, safe for the single gunshot wound in her head. While they knew she was guilty, she still needed to be officially judged. Which would probably happen as soon as the princess regained consciousness. By law, those guilty of any form of treason were not given a funeral. Their corpse was brought into space and then thrown out of the airlock so that no part of them would ever touch Hohmiy's soil again.

"So, she shot herself?"

The soft, slightly shaky voice of Lady Nadine pulled him out of his thoughts.

"Yes. The gun we found on her was stolen from the palace's armory. It seems my men have become lax."

"I see."

She turned back to the corpse and raised one of her gloved hands. It was shaking noticeably, and after hovering it over the body for a while, she brought it back to her side.

"I'm sorry."

"For what, Milady?"

"Not you. Her."

"Why would you feel sorry for a treacherous murderer?"

The alien sighed.

"What she did was unforgivable, I'm not going to argue that. But I can still understand her suffering and desperation that drove her to this deed. Suffering she wouldn't have had were it not for me."

"With all due respect, Milady, there is no need for you to try and empathize with someone like her. What she did was no one's fault but hers alone. And she would've died on the scaffold anyway, so it doesn't change much."

"That's a bit... simplistic, don't you think?"

"Is it? Would your people handle it differently?"

Lady Nadine started to slowly pace around the table where the corpse was lying.

"I'm no lawyer, but she would probably get a lifetime in prison."

That surprised the guard captain.

"Not even attempted regicide warrants the death sentence on your planet? Then what does?"

"That depends on who you ask, but in many countries, mine included: Nothing. We don't execute criminals."

"What, you think someone like her doesn't deserve to die?" He did his best to stay respectful, but the thought that a traitor like her would be allowed to live agitated him.

"It's not about whether or not someone deserves to die for their deed. It's about whether or not the power to decide over the life and death of others is something the state should be allowed to hold. We came to the conclusion that the answer to that is no."

Her gaze wandered back to the corpse.

"Up until this morning, I was absolutely fuming. Never in my life have I felt such an unbound hatred. Had I met her, I... honestly, I have no idea what I would've done, and I dread finding out. But now that I see her like this... huh? Wait a minute..."

Very slowly, her hands approached the dead woman's head. Carefully, she grabbed, lifted, and then turned it. A few moments later, she put it back down. Turning around so she was now facing him, she balled her hands into fists and twisted her face into an expression that was vastly different from what she had displayed so far. Kessga didn't know why, but it somehow gave him an eerie feeling.

"This was no suicide." She spat the words out of her mouth like rotten food. It took the guard captain a moment to process what he had just heard.

"Wait, what do you mean, "no suicide"?"

"The angle is wrong. Oldest mistake in the book when it comes to faked suicides."

"You have a book on faked suicides?"

"What? No, that's just a figure of... okay, we DO have books on... you know what, forget it. My point is, she was killed by someone else. She was either framed for the crime or had an accomplice who decided to tie up loose ends. There still is a culprit to find, this case is NOT closed."

She turned on her heel and marched to the door.

"Screw this! I'm done hiding!"

Twentieth day after my arrival

Dear Diary

I will find them.