Rosa didn't believe in many things. She didn't believe in fate, she didn't believe in destiny, and she definitely didn't believe in karma. But what she did believe in was a good strong drink, and oh boy did she need one now. Not that she'd ever be able to get one.

"You want me to do what?"

The prince of the Aesar Galaxy shifted in the seat in front of her, the yellow plastic creaking and contrasting badly with his tailored black suit and overcoat. His long fingers tapped on her dirt-strewn desk, but he avoided looking her in the eye. Rosa's tail twitched with irritation and loathing, the red band around it flashing softly with her annoyed heartbeats.

"I want you to find my fiancée."

"You want me to find your fiancée," Rosa drawled. "Your fiancée who, if the rumors are true, is also a murderous Plithia princess who spews fire and has four glass feet."

"Well, three glass feet now. She shed one." He pointed at said glass foot, now perched prettily on Rosa's desk like some sort of extravagant paperweight. Was one less foot supposed to be an improvement that ignored the whole murderous fire-breathing thing?

Not that Rosa was one to talk or judge at this point, but still.

It was amazing to think that the prince across from her was her friend growing up and later her boyfriend for what would be an ill-fated attempt at romance. Turned out, he just really wasn't her type, although she certainly was his. But nothing went to plan. At least not hers.

Rosa glared at the prince.

"Rosa, you're good at this kind of stuff!"

"No I'm not. Just because I caught the rogue lupine doesn't mean I'm suddenly qualified to take down a plithian. Also, what are you even doing trying to marry a plithian? They eat their spouses, Kane."

Kane shook his head, the silver tattoos on the side of his face glittering in the dim overhead light.

"She's truly a beautiful being, Rosa. Truly. Fascinating, really. She'll be perfect."

"Well yeah, that's the point. Beauty is how Plithians attract their prey. Her prey being you."

"I'm not her prey, if anything she's mine." Rosa hid a grimace as he leered. She changed the subject.

"How did you lose her? We are on a space outpost in the middle of nowhere. There isn't that far for her to go."

Which was very true. The Devian outpost was small. A space colony floating on the outskirts of Aesar, only people with no home, no family, and nowhere else to go ended up here. Like Rosa, the abandoned, black-tailed mechanic.

This was the place for the outcasts of Aesar as well as one of the fringe science facilities. There truly was no inbetween.

"I don't know. She said she needed to feed. One minute she was there and the next she wasn't." He put a hand through his dark blue, almost black, hair. Rosa pursed her lips.

"Oh for- and you just let her? Kane, Plithians eat other beings. That's what feed means. You know, for the crown prince of a galaxy, you sure are far too arrogant and irresponsible for anyone's good."

Least of all hers, and maybe the princess's too, if Rosa's suspicions were correct. She really hoped they weren't.

"I'm not irresponsible! In fact, I'm perfectly responsible. That's why I'm marrying Elana. At least for a bit. It's diplomacy, really. And you know my top priority will always be the collection, anyway."

Dread started to creep into Rosa's mind. Oh no.

"The collection-"

A loud blare sounded as the intercom system sprung to life.

"Rosa Haverfield to hangar six. Rosa Haverfield to hangar six." Rosa groaned, getting to her feet with a huff. Maybe he'd leave her be now. Brushing down her cargo pants and straightening her red jacket, her tail flicking, she walked to the door of her office, Kane on her heels.

"Wait, where are you going?" He trotted along to keep up with her, his long coat swishing around his knees.

"Hangar six, obviously." Rosa ignored the stares as they passed a group of female engineers, each of them eyeing up Kane. One of them sneered at Rosa. Kane didn't notice.

"I thought you were going to help me," Kane said, his voice sharp. He managed to get ahead of her, moving to stand in front, but Rosa swerved out of the way, maintaining her quick clip.

"I help you only as long as it's convenient to me, and right now, it's not convenient to me. That's always been our agreement, Kane. So stop following me and go find your fire-breathing wife."

"Fiancée. And I think you need to remember who you're talking to, Rosa." The words were a warning. One that Rose chose not to heed.

"Fine, fire-breathing fiancée. Whatever." Rosa quickened her pace, but Kane still kept up, staying level with her to the best of his ability. They passed loading docks and labs, workstations and tool shops, but he kept up the pace.

"Why are you still following me?"

"I need your-"

"Help, yes, got it. But can you please just not? The quicker I get to hangar six, the quicker I can help you. And honestly, you really shouldn't be tagging along."

"Why not? I am the prince. If anything, you should be following me and doing what I say, not the other way around. That is your job."

The more time she spent with Kane, the more Rosa remembered why their friendship ended.

"No, this is my job. As in, my job right now is to probably go repair some ship. Which could take hours. Hours, that I do not want to spend in your company."

"How do you know it's a ship?"

"Because it's almost always a ship. We're here now though, so scoot." Holding up her ID card to the scanner, the door to hangar six slid open, just in time for a lab-coated scientist to come screaming out, his hair singed.

A terrible roar echoed through the hangar and Rosa and Kane gaped as a blonde woman in a purple dress breathed fire into the air. All around her, the technicians of hangar six were either hiding, running, or trying to do one of the two, their faces fear-stricken in the starlight from the large windows behind them and the firelight from the princess and the disaster zone she'd created.

Something in Rosa's gut twinged and a shiver went down her spine and all the way to the tip of her tail.

"I guess we found her."

Kane didn't respond, his mouth hanging open in awe. Rosa dragged him to the side of one of the few unharmed spaceships, pulling him out of the eyeline of the princess and nodding at the technicians huddled there too. One of the men rushed forward, grabbing Rosa by the arm.

"Rosa, thank goodness you're here. You can fix this right?" She recognized the man as Dr. O'fay, one of the head scientists in the outpost, but couldn't help but balk at him.

"Oh for- I am a mechanic. A mechanic. I don't specialize in fire-breathing princesses." Rosa glared at O'fay, but he just stared at her expectantly.

"Give me a break, Haverfield. You're the only one qualified for this kind of thing. Your work with the lupine was inspired! And that time with the seven hydraphines, too!"

Kane sent her a smug look and Rosa fought the urge to kick him. She should've just stayed in her pod this morning. She would have slept in, had a nice breakfast, relaxed-- but no, here she was. Twenty feet from a three-footed princess whose glass feet sparkled in the glow of amber flames.

"I'm sure all you have to do is talk to her and she'll leave us alone. At this rate, she'll blow a hole through the roof of the hangar."

Rosa glanced up, finding that the doctor was right. The ceiling of the hangar had begun to warp and bend due to the heat. The surrounding spaceships also suffered extreme damages. Rosa's knowledge of spaceship mechanics warned her that she really didn't have much time. Spaceship fuel, while not particularly combustible, was highly toxic. If the flame reached the fuel tank everyone in the room would die within seconds.

Which was debatably not a good thing.

"Doctor, I'm just as flammable as the rest of you." If not more so, but she knew he'd ignore that bit. They always did.

"Yes, but she'll listen to you. You're magnetic, these sorts are drawn to you." Rosa blinked at him, trying to understand how this man was a scientist. What an idiot.

"They are not drawn to me. That's not how it works. But fine, I'll talk to her. Then maybe I can actually do my real job."

Growling under her breath, Rosa clenched her fists, strutting out from behind the ship as calmly and confidently as she could.

"Elana? Want to cut that out?"

The princess's head snapped to look at her as her mouth closed, ruby lips shutting off the fire. Elana's blonde hair reflected the flickering light from the still smoldering flames of the ceiling and the burning spaceships.

"Who are you?" The princess's grasp of Aesaian, Rosa's language, was accented but clear. As was her hostility. Rosa smiled at her, the sick feeling in her stomach growing despite her mask of calm.

"I'm just here helping a friend. Now, want to tell me why you're doing this? You're pretty close to hurting someone." The princess tilted her head to the side, eyes squinting. Rosa straightened, her back tensing. She was being inspected.

"I think you understand well enough what I'm doing and why I'm doing it, silva."

Rosa's brow twitched. The princess knew what she was. Not that it was a big secret, but it made all the difference. She was the last of her kind in the galaxy.

"Do I?"

"You should. I doubt you want to be trapped here any more than I do. How do you like convincing poor unsuspecting beings to do what your keepers want? What do the old Earth tales call your type? Pied pipers?"

"That's really neither here nor there."

"Yes, and I'm sure you so like being their pet. That's what I'll be. That's what you are. Come on, silva, show a little backbone."
Rosa crossed her arms over her chest, eyeing the shifting scientists and technicians still hiding behind ships and equipment.

"I have plenty of backbone, thank you. Now why do you think you'll be a pet? You're about to become the wife to the crown prince."

"Yes, like I said, a pet. I'll be what you call a trophy wife, perhaps literally. He did take my foot as a decorative bauble, after all. Tell me, do you think they'll do the same thing to your tail one day?"

Mind flashing back to the glass foot sitting on top of her desk and the blinking device coiled on her tail, Rosa contained a flinch. Elana gave her a knowing look.

"Oh I see, they practically already have. Well, that is the way of things."

"I'm not their pet, and you won't be either." The words tasted ashen in her mouth and one look at the expression on Elana's flawless face told Rosa that the princess knew it was a lie. Or at least mostly a lie.

Nothing ever was so simple for Rosa.

"I know who you are, Rosa Haverfield. Friend of the prince, outcasted when you thought too high of yourself and got your grandmother killed trying to make friends with a wolf."

The princess got it half-right, but really, that wasn't too bad. She got the important bits.

"Well I know who you are too."

Elana rolled her eyes.

"Who doesn't?" Elana took a step towards Elana. "But the real question here is what are you going to do?"

Rosa looked back at Kane and the doctor. Both of them watched, pure fascination on their faces, and dare she say it, greed. Kane looked at Elana like he might a rare species or a famous piece of art.

She hated that Elana was right. The red band on her tail glowed tauntingly and the nausea from before almost overtook her.

"Nothing?" Elana sounded disappointed. Swallowing, Rosa shook her head.

"No. I'm sorry, Elana." Taking a deep breath, she summoned all of her strength and tried to ignore the guilt. She could feel her vocal cords tingling, just waiting to be put to use. Her tail throbbed. Elana began to open her mouth, but Rosa beat her to it.

"Elana, keep your mouth closed and your arms at your sides. Do not move until I say so." The princess froze, and Rosa could see the anger in her eyes.

The princess had no choice but to listen. That's all she could do. Rosa felt Kane come up behind her.

"Good job, Rosa. I knew you'd come through. She'll make a great addition to the collection, don't you think? Never as great as you were though. You always have been the best."

"Thanks, Kane."

"Oh, and don't forget; it's your turn to pick this time. Who should be added next?" Kane stroked his blue beard, waiting for Rosa to answer.

Rosa closed her eyes. It was a good thing karma didn't exist. If it were real, she'd be dead by now.

She hated all of this. She hated that she couldn't stop. She hated that she was a coward. And she hated what she said next.

"I've heard about this princess with glowing hair..."

About the Author:

Sarah Penney aka Pennywithaney writes Fantasy, Realistic Fiction, Historical Fiction, and lots and lots of Fairy Tale Retellings. The writer of wattpad stories such as Glass Slippers and A Kind of Bravery, Sarah puts magic, quirky characters, and often a sassy dragon or two into her work. A college student pursuing a degree in English, she doesn't have a whole lot of time to write creatively these days, but relishes the chance when she can!

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