Symbiosis

by R S Penney

  Wesley Pennfield spun around with a hand clamped over his mouth. He closed his eyes, breathing deeply. “You don't understand the devastating power of this technology,” he said at last. “Furthermore, our goal is not to prevent Lenai from accessing the Gate; if we manage to do so, I will consider it a serendipitous bonus, but our real goal is to create a public spectacle. I want people to witness the violent power of Leyrian weaponry.”

  Pennfield was genuinely pleased with himself. The only time Bill ever saw the man smile was during these moments where one of his plans came together. “Prepare a media campaign highlighting the dangers of alien technologies. Begin by leaking rumours to the tabloids with emphasis on the devastation we've already seen. Anna Lenai has been kind enough to supply us with plenty of fodder for the rumour mill.

  “The firepower unleashed by these drones will cause enough damage to squash any hope of a cover-up. Even if the government denies any knowledge of alien involvement, we will release evidence to the mainstream media with an added dose of fear mongering. If we cannot keep Earth and Leyria apart, we can at least make them despise each other.”

  Chapter 26

  The sky was a deep blue with the onset of twilight, the last rays of the setting sun bouncing off the windows of tall office buildings. Cars whooshed past on Bank Street, headed for the waterfront.

  Summer was in full swing with teens and twenty-somethings shuffling along the sidewalk under the light of bright neon signs above storefront windows. Guys in shorts and tees and young women in sundresses. Most weren't that much younger than Jack – and some were older – but they felt like children to him. Children for whom he'd become responsible. Now, that was an odd thing to consider.

  Jack stood on the street corner.

  He wore blue jeans and a black t-shirt with a V-neck, his dark hair combed so that messy bangs fell over his forehead. “Cheer up, Hunter,” he said with a shrug. “You have as much of a social life as them.”

  Slipping hands into his pockets, Jack frowned down at the sidewalk. “Everybody says you're the life of the tactical briefings,” he muttered, shaking his head. “You make covert affairs seem fun!”

  The sense of someone approaching made him turn.

  Anna stood on the corner in a pale green sundress with thin straps and a bow on the waist. Her hair was tied back with tiny beads on the strands that framed her face, and somehow she had found a pair of green ballet flats.

  Grinning like a toddler with a stolen cookie, Anna went beet red. She bowed her head to avoid eye contact. “So with full knowledge of the considerable effort I put into this,” she began, “how do I look?”

  Jack felt his jaw drop. He squeezed his eyes shut, then gave his head a shake. “Um, you look incredible,” he managed without too much trouble. “So, does this mean what I think it means?”

  “Well, we've both acknowledged certain feelings.” Anna bit her lip, nodding as she chose her next words. “So that being the case, I think you'll be able to figure out what's going to happen next.”

  “Oh! Oh! I know this one!” Jack exclaimed. “Your old boyfriend Laszlo wakes up from his five-year coma and comes to town in a hackneyed attempt to draw out the will-they won't-they plot for one more season.”

  “No, silly.”

  Grinning like an idiot, Jack bowed his head. He chuckled softly to himself. “You mean that's not it?” he exclaimed. “Geez! I guess all those teen soaps really steered me in the wrong direction.”

  “We're going on a date,” Anna said, stepping forward. She looked up at him with the most earnest expression, and for the first time Jack realized she was even more nervous than he was. “So, how should we begin?”

  “Frozen yogurt.”

  “Frozen yogurt?”

  For the love of God, how was it possible that hearing her use the word date only strengthened his anxiety? Jack wasn't an expert on the subject, but he had always figured that knowing a woman reciprocated your affections took the edge off. Apparently not. If those soaps were to be believed, feeling so nervous your nails dug furrows in your palm was supposed to be part of the fun. “Yeah, I know a place,” he said in a voice so steady he half wondered if it was really his own. “Come on. It's just a few blocks from here.”

  She walked next to him, staring down at the ground, deep in thought. “So, I've done some thinking,” Anna said, shrugging her shoulders. “And I think that I could learn to like it here.”

  Jack was a little too wrapped up in his feelings to process what she had just said. In fact, it took him a moment to realize she had been speaking. Christ! Not two minutes into their first date and he had already developed the fabled male attention span. “Earth does have some unique features.”

  “Such as?”

  “The Grand Canyon, the Great Wall of China, global warming. A thriving novelty t-shirt industry that I'm told represents point three percent of the GDP.”

  Anna shuffled along with arms folded, shaking her head as she laughed at his joke. It was good to know that he could make her giggle. “Really?” she said. “Point three? See, I would have figured point two at most.”

  Jack grinned, pinching the bridge of his nose with two fingers. “And that's why I'm essential to this operation,” he said. “Where would you be without me?”

  “Lost.”

  When he looked over his shoulder, he found her watching him with an intensity in those big blue eyes. “Completely lost,” Anna went on. “Hungry, frightened and so very, very lonely.”

  That left him taken aback. He found himself staring up at the skyscrapers on either side of the street, watching the people as they frolicked on the sidewalk. “Then I'm glad I could be of service.”

  “Can I tell you something?”

  “Sure.”

  Anna walked beside him with her arms crossed, smiling down at the sidewalk. “This is the first real date that I've ever been on,” she said with a shiver. “And I'm glad you're the one I get to share that with.”

  Jack took her hand, twining his fingers with hers, and gave a squeeze. This was a side of her that he'd never seen before. The Anna he knew was the very image of poise and confidence. She could be defiant or gentle or delightfully charming, but he would never have thought it possible for her to be anxious. So far as Jack was concerned, that word didn't exist in her lexicon.

  Anna very deliberately stumbled sideways, nudging him with her shoulder. When he looked, she was wearing that impish grin of hers. “I wanted to go in that direction,” she said. “You just happened to be standing there.”

  Business was booming down at Froyo and Sam's with over a dozen young people packed between four walls that were painted in bright neon green and orange. Each and every one of the small round tables was occupied.

  Anna stepped in front of him with hands clasped behind her back, turning her head as she scanned the room. “It's colourful!” she said with a bounce in her step. “I like that a lot. What flavour should we get?”

  Tapping his lips, Jack turned his face up to the ceiling. He felt deep furrows stretch across his brow. “That is a tough one,” he said. “But I have to go with chocolate-mint for the win.”

  “I was thinking about strawberry.” Anna whirled around to face him with a big grin on her face, a mischievous glint in those blue eyes. “With real chunks of fruit blended in. Maybe we could share?”

  Crossing his arms, Jack gave her a withering glare. He shook his head. “Are you actually turning down chocolate-mint?” he teased. “It's only the most heavenly flavour ever created!”

  Anna stuck her tongue out.

  Well, it seemed he was going to have to prove his point. Before she could say one word, Jack marched across the room to the yogurt dispensers. He grabbed a cup from the wall and filled it with a blend of chocolate and mint. Thankfully, they kept the spoons on a small shelf nearby.

  Through the bond with his Nassai, he saw her coming up behind him. Well, maybe saw was the wrong word. It was more of a mental image that began as a silhouette. Hi
s knowledge of the room and of Anna's appearance let him add colour without having to think about it. “Oh come on,” she said. “Yogurt is always better with fruit.”

  Jack spun around.

  “I love real straw-”

  He shoved a spoonful of yogurt into her mouth before she could finish her sentence, and her eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. The spoon waggled up and down as she spoke. “The deliciousness of this confection in no way diminishes the truth of my well-reasoned argument.”

  Jack slapped a hand over his face, trembling with laughter. “Very well,” he said. “If you can still hold out after that, I yield to your superior tenacity. Though I'll point out that I've already filled a bowl, and now I have to buy this.”

  “Damn it!” Anna teased. “He's more clever than he looks.”

  The lack of seating presented a problem, so Anna suggested they go for a walk. She wanted to see the waterfront, which was fine with him. Hell, he was making this up as he went along anyway.

  Was this how most people approached a first date? Nineteen years of Western pop culture had inculcated him with the idea that he was supposed to plan something fairly elaborate. Dinner at a fancy restaurant. It dawned on him that he could actually afford that now, but somehow he had the impression that wasn't the kind of date Anna would enjoy. What she wanted most was to see the city.

  That was easy enough to arrange. He led her down Queen Street where skyscrapers stood tall and ominous with lights in their windows. Anna seemed genuinely intrigued by the architecture, and he was almost tempted to ask whether her world had such buildings. That was a silly question, of course; any world that could build star ships would have no difficulty with skyscrapers.

  Maybe it was just the thrill of seeing a new place. He'd often dreamed of travelling to Europe and parts of Asia. Mainly just to see what was there. Anna hadn't had much of a chance to really look at the city since arriving here.

  It pleased him to realize that his initial nervousness had dwindled; in fact, he felt very much at ease. This felt the same as every other time he'd hung out with Anna except that he didn't have to pretend he wasn't just a wee bit infatuated.

  Christ, but she was beautiful.

  It wasn't that he had never noticed before – this wasn't one of those Rachel Leigh Cook on the Stairs moments – but until today, Jack had never allowed himself to really contemplate it. He had always stifled such thoughts. The idea that she might actually want such attention from him was so novel that he still had trouble believing it.

  “What?” she asked when she caught him looking.

  Covering a grin with one hand, Jack shut his eyes. He shook his head and tried not to laugh. “Nothing, An,” he managed after a moment. “I'm just amused by the number of improbable things that also happen to be true.”

  A quick walk up Metcalfe brought them to Wellington Street where the Parliament buildings stood tall and proud. With floods of light shining on its facade, the Centre Block – home to both the House of Commons and the Senate – had been visible for quite some time before they finally arrived at its front gate.

  Two wings stretched out from either side of a clock tower with dark windows lining each of their five stories. The slanted rooftops had been restored to their proper shade of copper, but a patina of green still covered the tower's peak.

  Craning her neck, Anna squinted at the building. She seemed to be lost in thought. “So this is the seat of your government,” she said with a nod. “Somehow I had expected something that resembled an asylum.”

  “I choose to postpone my feigned outrage just long enough to inform you that I've taken the tour, and I can assure you that the walls are sufficiently padded. So why would you go and say a thing like that?”

  “If I understand matters correctly,” she replied, “your government is well aware of the fact that much of the technology you use is harmful to the ecosystem. Several viable alternatives exist if you would only create the infrastructure, but despite over fifty years of warnings, you do nothing.”

  “You obviously don't comprehend the situation,” Jack said with a nod. “This is all part of our fiendish plan to fend off an alien invasion.”

  “Oh really?”

  “Mmmhmm,” Jack went on. “You see, we figure if we act like complete morons, the galactic community will think there's something in the water supply and deem this planet unsuitable for colonization.”

  Anna crossed her arms, smiling down at herself. She shook her head with rueful exasperation. “Well, I take it back then,” she said. “Clearly yours is a nation of brilliant strategists and tacticians.”

  “Don't be too hard on yourself,” Jack teased. “Not everyone can be as clever as the folks in Canadian Parliament.”

  “Apparently not.”

  “Come on,” he said. “I've got more to show you.”

  To her great delight, the anxiety that had tightened Anna's chest had melted away to be replaced by a sense of warmth and affection. Relationships were new territory for her; oh, there had been boys in her past, but never anyone with long-term potential. She was only twenty years old, after all.

  Revealing her intentions had been difficult. She had been terrified that Jack would look at her like a madwoman when she said the word date. Of course, those were the thoughts of a woman who had departed Logic Station on a one-way train to Crazy Town, but you stood a better chance of winning a gunfight with a butter knife than you did of subduing your anxieties with rational thought.

  Jack had taken care of that for her.

  He had a way of disarming her, of making her feel safe. At first, she had feared it might have been her own naivety – she wanted to see the best in people – but weeks of living with him had proved to her that his kindness was genuine. And his bravery. His intelligence. What would he be capable of if he only saw himself for what he really was?

  The black waters of the Ottawa River lapped against the foot of a grassy slope, light from a nearby lamp reflecting upon the rippling waves. In the distance, a bridge stretched across the water to the city of Gatineau where tall buildings stood beneath the starry sky.

  Anna sat on a bench with hands folded in her lap, staring off into the distance. For the moment, she was content to just sit quietly and enjoy the view. If she were fated to live the rest of her life on this world, Ottawa would be a fine place to do it.

  “So, you've never been on a real date?” Jack asked.

  Smiling down into her lap, Anna closed her eyes. She shook her head with a soft sigh. “There's never been anyone to go with,” she explained. “When I was a teenager, I had a boyfriend, but it was what you'd call puppy love.”

  In the dim light, she saw Jack smile. He nodded, staring out at the water. “Well, at least you avoided the drama,” he said. “From what I'm told, high school relationships are overflowing with it.”

  “From what you're told?”

  “I never had one,” he admitted. “There were girls, but I never quite worked up the courage to talk to them.”

  Pressing her lips together, Anna stared out on the water. She blinked, considering his words. “How very sad for you,” she said. “Of course, it resulted in you being single, which is very good for me.”

  “I'm glad you have your priorities straight.”

  “Indeed I do,” she teased. “Now that we've got that settled, let's move on to more pressing matters.”

  “Like what?”

  Anna scooched closer, slipping an arm around his waist. He seemed to understand the message and wrapped an arm around her shoulder. Now all she had to do was resist the urge to tickle him.

  Leaning her head against his chest, Anna shut her eyes. She murmured contentedly when he squeezed her tight. “Much better,” she whispered. “It's not nice to let your date get cold, you know.”

  At that, he slid both arms around her. Being snuggled up with him brought a sense of warmth and safety that was almost enough to make her forget how far she was from home. A burst of resolve followed. Jack
was her friend…her lover, and she would protect him no matter what.

  No matter what.

  She knew that she would give her life for him without hesitation just as she knew that he would do the same for her. They would fight side by side, drawing a line against injustice, and when all was said and done, the world would be a little better.

  Before she could wonder whether he felt it too, Jack touched his fingertips to the underside of her chin. He tilted her face up and brought his lips to hers.

  At first it was the most gentle kiss she could imagine, coupled with the soft caress of his fingers on her cheek, but it wasn't long before a hunger came over him. Jack pulled her close.

  She seized his face in both hands and broke contact just long enough to nuzzle his nose with hers. Then she was kissing him again, slipping her arms around his back and grabbing his shirt.

  Anna pulled away from him, blinking over and over. She tossed her head about to clear the fog. “Wow…” she said breathlessly. “That…that was…where exactly did you learn to do that?”

  “For a guy who never had a girlfriend,” Anna began, “you certainly know a thing or two about kissing.”

  Jack was smiling into his lap, shaking his head with amusement. “Well, this might not be a shock to you,” he rasped. “But I've been thinking about doing that for quite some time now.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah,” he whispered. “Sorry.”

  Anna brushed that lock of hair out of her face, squinting as she thought about his response. “Sorry?” she mumbled. “Why in the Verse should you be sorry for wanting to kiss me?”

  He scrubbed a hand across his brow, wiping sweat away. Despite his best efforts, his skin still glistened. “It might have made things awkward,” Jack said. “I wasn't sure you returned my feelings.”

  Well, she could understand that. After all, she had spent quite a bit of time trying to hide those feelings from him. Trying and failing, but that didn't change that it had probably sent some mixed signals.

  Should she tell him that she had imagined kissing him too? That she had imagined more than kissing? Images of waking up naked in his arms flashed through her mind, and the heat in her face made her wonder if her skin might catch fire. “Well, Jack, I suppose I can forgive you on one condition.”