“I’m here because I don’t want you to start a war based off my mother’s lies,” Shey says, her voice surprisingly fierce. She takes a deep breath and flicks hair out of her face, collecting herself again. “I don’t want you to start a war at all. I believe there’s another way.”

“Another way to do what?” I ask, glancing at Scorpia. Even after our heart-to-heart, I feel a flicker of doubt, wondering if she still hasn’t told me the whole truth—but she looks as confused as I am.

“Your mother didn’t tell us anything about what she’s doing,” Scorpia says. “Though I assumed this is part of her crazy plan for Gaian independence, sped up because of the storms and shit on your planet. Wiping out only the people so she can have Titan’s resources, Nibiru’s food supply.”

I think again of Titan, of the rapid updates flooding my phone. Whole forts wiped out, entire cities gone. I set my jaw, leaning forward to speak to Shey again.

“Talk faster.”

“I’ll be frank, then.” Shey raises her eyes to meet mine, lifting her chin as if to show she’s not afraid of me. “Gaia is dying.”

I blink, and scrutinize Shey’s expression for some sign that she’s lying, but find nothing.

“Dying?” Scorpia repeats, and then her confusion seems to clear. “The crop fields, the sanitation checks, now the storms… It is all connected somehow.”

Shey gives a small, miserable nod.

“Gaia is no longer the home I knew, and it’s only getting worse. That’s why my mother brought me to Deva in the first place.”

Unease prickles on the back of my neck. I thought a blossoming war was bad enough, but it seems the situation is even more complicated than we thought.

“When did it start?” The moment I ask the question, Shey’s eyes drop, and she bites her lip.

“I’m not supposed to know the details. My mother—”

“Your mother already wiped out Titan and is trying to use us to kill Nibiru. You owe us a full explanation.”

Shey shuts her eyes for a moment, takes a deep breath, and opens them again.

“I suppose I’m already committing treason,” she says. “As Scorpia knows, I work in Gaia’s alien research department. We discovered a new Primus technology. Something we found buried deep in the earth, beneath the statues. It—”

“Hold up, beneath the statues?” Scorpia butts in, sitting up straighter.

“Yes. There’s a whole network of Primus-made tunnels below them. We haven’t even finished mapping them out.”

“Knew there was something weird about those things,” Scorpia mutters.

“Keep talking,” I tell Shey.