Three Tiny Lights and One Big Plan

Vera sat inside the space car and finally let her shoulders drop. The guard had brought her water and a small snack, and for a moment, neither of them spoke. To him, this whole situation was ridiculous. He and his wife had spent every saving they had just to nurture one child from a tube, and those three men, who controlled most of the wealth and power in the galaxy, had managed to create three children without spending a single coin, without praying over a glass chamber, without selling pieces of their lives to afford a chance. He felt bad for the woman in front of him, but he could not understand why she was smiling after being sentenced to exile in the garbage sector.

Vera did not explain herself. She leaned back against the seat, closed her eyes, and slipped into the space inside her mind. In her former life, she had collected everything she could get her hands on. Food, seeds, medicine, weapons, tools, books, water filters, old machines, spare parts, blankets, and anything else that might one day keep her alive. She had built a hidden warehouse because in her old world, only stupid people believed tomorrow would take care of itself. Somehow, after she entered this body, that warehouse had followed her and turned into a safe storage inside her own mind. It was bigger than before, cleaner, protected, and organized in rows that stretched farther than she could see.

Inside that space, she was not pregnant. Her body felt light again, free from the constant pull on her back and the pressure under her ribs. Instead of her round belly, three small bulbs of light floated in front of her. One was gold, one was silver, and one was purple, each glowing with its own strange little pulse. Vera looked at them for a moment, still not fully used to the fact that the babies could meet her here, talk to her here, and watch the world through her even before they were born.

“Okay, babies,” Vera said, brushing her fingers gently through the warm air around them. “Play here for a bit. Mommy needs to organize some things. We are going to the best place possible. I know you hate that we are going to a garbage planet, but that place has soil, and I have so many seeds. In a few months, we are going to eat the best food possible.”

“But Mommy, it is very dangerous there,” the golden light said, his tiny voice filled with worry that sounded too old for something not yet born. “I cannot protect you.”

“I agree with Brother,” the silver light added, moving closer to the gold one as if standing beside him made the warning stronger.

“Mommy, I can heal you,” the purple light said softly, her glow flickering with brave little sparks. “Do not worry. We are small, but we still will not let anyone hurt you.”

Vera’s face softened in a way no one in the courtroom would have recognized. She knew from the book plot that she would have two boys and one girl, but the book had never covered anything like this. In the original story, Vera suffered greatly. The trial outcome was mostly the same, but she was allowed to enter galaxy lands more often because she kept fighting for parental rights, begging for support, and dragging the fathers through one hearing after another. 

The heroine of that book had been written like a stupid girl who fell in love with three men right away, but this Vera did not even know how those men looked beyond the public descriptions and the broken memories left behind by the original host. She could guess from what she remembered of the book, but her mind had forgotten how to care about fantasy faces. She had read that story in a ruined world just to kill time, to distract herself from hunger, smoke, and the sound of zombies dragging their feet outside whatever shelter she had found that night. She had not been lying on a soft couch with a cup of tea. The moment she closed the chapter, she had picked up her weapon and gone back outside to kill the dead again.

Right now, she did not know what anyone would look like in the end, and she did not care. What she knew was more useful. In three years, someone would discover that the soil on the garbage planet was full of nutrients, and the wealthy would suddenly decide that land they had ignored was valuable. They would try to buy it, claim it, clean it up, and pretend they had always known its worth. Vera’s plan was different. She was going to claim that land herself before any of them woke up and realized trash could become treasure.

In reality, the first step was simple. She needed to build a house, and she already had one stored in her mind space. She only needed to take it out and place it somewhere stable. The fence would be harder. She was not as strong in this body, and pregnancy made every task slower, but she knew people lived in that sector. Forgotten people, desperate people, the ones the galaxy used and threw away. If she could secure a small patch of land, grow something fast, and offer food as compensation for work, she could claim the land properly and become the sole owner before anyone important noticed. No one could fight her if she registered it first under the exile code. No one looked closely at garbage until there was profit in it.

Her plan was clear: get the land, register the land, plant the seeds, start a business, and build enough money and protection before the fathers or their future brides became a threat. With the nutrients in that soil, simple vegetables could grow in two days. Two days. In three years, she could be rich enough to keep her children safe, and if this galaxy wanted to underestimate a human woman with no powers and a criminal number attached to her name, that was their problem.

“Thank you, babies,” Vera said, her voice softer as she reached toward the three glowing bulbs. “You are the best. Still so small, but already so smart.”

She was right. The children were smart. Too smart, maybe, but nothing about them was normal. Nothing about her life had ever been normal either, so she accepted it and moved on.

“Mommy, I am sorry about Dad,” the golden bulb said, his light dimming at the edges. “He is just so proud. I wish I was not his son.”

The golden child belonged to Prince Valerian, and Vera knew he had already inherited part of his father’s dragon power. For the past week, she had been able to start small fires because of him, just enough to cook simple food for herself. The original girl had been poor, living in the slums with almost nothing, and Vera had no desire to waste what little money she had. With her mind space and the child’s fire, at least food had been one less problem.

“Me too,” the silver ball said, his voice quieter but sharper. “How could someone who protects the galaxy not protect Mommy and me?”

The silver child was Xen’s, and he was already frighteningly smart. In this space, his power helped Vera recharge, letting her feel better in the real world once she left the mind space. His energy was pure force, steady and dangerous, and Vera could already tell he would grow into something as strong and lethal as his father. Maybe stronger, if she raised him away from pride and away from the kind of honor that only mattered when people were watching.

“I am sad too,” the purple ball whispered, her light trembling. “I thought Daddy was kind. He is a doctor himself, and he just abandoned me and Mommy.”

Her tiny voice broke, and the purple light started crying.

“Come here, my loves,” Vera said, opening her arms wide.

The three bulbs rushed into her, pressing against her chest and arms like tiny stars trying to hide inside her skin. Vera wrapped herself around them the only way she could in that space, holding their light close, brushing her hands over each glow until they stopped shaking. It was strange, this softness in her chest. Strange and dangerous. She had spent so many years cutting softness out of herself because kindness got people killed, trust got people buried, and love gave others a knife to press under your ribs. But with these children, she felt something old in herself move again, something that had existed before the apocalypse turned her cold.

“No crying, okay?” Vera said, keeping her voice steady for them. “I know you are sad. That is allowed. But your daddies are not complete monsters, and your mommy is not sad about leaving them behind. I also wanted them to take responsibility, but your mommy is poor, human, and this galaxy does not like people like me. This space is the only power I have right now, but I promise you, I will make you the happiest kids in this galaxy. A bit of struggle is not a problem when I have you here, so do not waste your little hearts on being sad for men who do not know what they threw away.”