The Last Y Chromosome

The first thing I felt was the dirt. Grit in my mouth, gravel digging into my shoulder blade, the cold weight of stone pressing against my spine. The second thing was the light.

Not sunlight. Something colder. A blue-white pulse that throbbed against my eyelids like a heartbeat.

"Eyes open, Guardian. We don't have time for a nap."

The voice was smooth, almost musical, and it came from somewhere above me. I forced my eyes open and immediately wished I hadn't.

She floated maybe three feet above my chest, a woman made of light and something else. Her skin shifted like liquid glass, translucent in places, revealing currents of pale blue energy where muscle and bone should have been. Her hair moved on its own, drifting in slow waves that had nothing to do with wind. And her eyes, those were the worst part. They were kind. Genuinely, terrifyingly kind.

"Up," she said. "Now."

I rolled onto my hands and knees. My body moved like it belonged to someone else, joints stiff, muscles remembering a shape they'd forgotten. The armor came next. I looked down at my hands and saw gauntlets, scratched and dented, the leather straps worn soft from use. Someone else's hands. Someone else's armor.

"Where am I?"

"Old Chicago. Dead zone. And before you ask, yes, you died. Yes, I brought you back. No, we don't have time for the full explanation because there's a Fallen patrol heading this way and they've already picked up my signal."

I stood. The world tilted, then steadied. We were in the shell of an old parking garage, concrete pillars crumbling, rebar jutting from broken slabs like exposed bones. Gray light filtered through gaps in the ceiling. Rain had pooled in the corners, black and still.

"Fallen," I repeated. The word felt familiar in my mouth, like a language I'd learned in a dream.

"Eliksni, technically. But yes. Fallen." She drifted closer, close enough that I could see the tiny constellations moving inside her. "They're all female now. Has been that way for a while. The males died out, or got converted, depends on who you ask. Point is, they're coming, and they're not going to ask about your pronouns before they start shooting."

I found a rifle propped against the pillar next to me. It felt right in my hands, which was its own kind of unsettling. "And you?"

"Ghost. Your Ghost." She paused, and something flickered across her translucent face. Embarrassment? "My name's Lyra. I've been waiting for you for a long time."

"How long?"

"Long enough that I stopped counting." She turned, her body shifting in the air, and I noticed the way her form moved. She was shaped like a woman, curves and angles in all the right places, but her skin was like gel, like the surface of a jellyfish, and I could see through her in patches. The light inside her pulsed faster when she was nervous. It was pulsing fast now.

"Contact," she said. "Sixty meters. They're in the stairwell."

I heard them before I saw them. A chittering sound, like insects communicating through clicking mandibles. Then the first one came through the doorway.

She was tall, seven feet at least, with four arms and a helmet shaped like a skull. Her armor was purple and gold, ornate in a way that suggested rank. And her chest, I couldn't help but notice, was unmistakably female, the armor shaped to accommodate breasts that moved with each step. The other two behind her were smaller, leaner, their carapaces a mottled blue. All female. All armed.

The lead one stopped when she saw me. Her four eyes, compound and glittering, fixed on my face. Then she made a sound I hadn't expected. A laugh. Low and clicking, but unmistakably a laugh.

"A male," she said. Her voice was a rasp, filtered through her helmet's vocoder. "I haven't seen a male in twenty cycles. I thought they were a myth."

"Lucky me," I said.

"Lucky you," she agreed. And then she raised her weapon.

I moved before I thought. The rifle came up, my finger found the trigger, and the shot took her in the shoulder. She staggered, more surprised than hurt, and the two behind her scattered. I ducked behind a pillar as return fire chewed chunks out of the concrete. Lyra zipped past my ear, her body streaking light.

"Nice shot. Now move."

I moved. Ran low, slid behind a collapsed wall, came up firing. The second Fallen went down, her helmet cracking against the floor. The third screamed, a high, piercing sound, and charged.

She was fast. Faster than something that big should be. I got one shot off, missed, and then she was on me, her lower arms pinning my rifle while her upper arms reached for my throat. Up close, I could smell her. Something like ozone and burnt sugar. Her eyes, all four of them, were wide and wild.

"You're real," she breathed. "You're actually real."

"Let go."

"Why would I do that?" She tilted her head. "You're the first male I've seen since I was a hatchling. The first one any of us have seen. Do you have any idea what that means?"

"Enlighten me."

She leaned closer. Her breath was warm against my face. "It means you're valuable. It means every Kell, every Baron, every Archon in the system is going to want you. It means wars will be fought over you." She smiled, and her teeth were needle-sharp. "It means I'm not going to kill you. I'm going to keep you."

Lyra appeared between us, her form flaring bright. "Back off."

The Fallen hissed. "A Ghost. How quaint. You think you can stop me?"

"I think I can blind you for ten seconds and give him a clear shot. Want to test it?"

The Fallen considered. Then she released me, stepping back with her hands raised. "Fine. Keep him. For now." She looked at me, and there was something in her eyes that made my skin crawl. Hunger. Curiosity. Something in between. "We'll meet again, little male. And next time, your Ghost won't be able to save you."

She vanished into the shadows of the stairwell, dragging her wounded companion with her.

I stood there, breathing hard, rifle still raised. My heart was pounding. My hands were shaking. And somewhere in the back of my mind, a question was forming. A question I didn't want to ask.

"Lyra," I said. "What did she mean, every Kell and Baron is going to want me?"

Lyra was quiet for a long moment. When she spoke, her voice was smaller than before.

"It means what it sounds like. You're the only male left. The only one in the entire system. And that makes you a lot of things." She met my eyes. "A prize. A resource. A threat."

"A threat to who?"

"To everyone who's spent the last twenty cycles building a world without men." She drifted closer, her translucent hand hovering near my cheek without touching. "I brought you back because I need you. But I won't lie to you. I also brought you back because you're the only chance we have of changing things. And that means a lot of people are going to want you dead."

I lowered the rifle. The rain had started again, dripping through the cracks above, running down my armor in thin streams.

"So what do we do?"

"We run," Lyra said. "We find allies. We figure out what you are and why you're here." She paused. "And we try not to get captured by anyone who wants to keep you in a cage."

I looked at the stairwell where the Fallen had disappeared. Then I looked at my Ghost, this strange, beautiful creature made of light and slime and something like hope.

"Lead the way," I said.

She smiled. It was the first time I'd seen her smile, and it did something to my chest that I wasn't ready to name.

"Welcome back to the world, Guardian. Try not to die again."

I followed her into the dark. Behind me, the rain kept falling. Ahead, somewhere in the ruins of a city that had forgotten what men looked like, the rest of the world was waiting. And every single one of them was a woman.

I had a feeling this was going to be complicated.