“We can get some medicine here. Maybe even see a doctor,” Sky said. “You’ll like Boone, Hawk. They’ll like you, too. They’ll love your glider.”
“They won’t try to take it, will they?” he asked.
“I won’t let them,” Sky assured, stroking his hair. His breathing settled, but when she tried to give him more water, he shook his head. “Hawk, when you see me with your other eyes—when you see me glow—do I look old to you?”
“You look like fire,” he shrugged, rubbing his face. “But you don’t do that anymore. Not since we left Rocan.”
“Marius said their medical test showed I was over a hundred years old,” she said.
“You told Eddie you were a hundred,” Hawk reminded her with a weak smile. “How old are you?”
“I lost count,” she said, looking at her Virp again, regretting bringing up the topic. Her inadvertent confession to the one female doctor she’d encountered in Rocan had come after an inadvertent and unexpected nap that left her groggy, terrified, and talkative. Also, Eddie was the first person Sky had met in Rocan who believed Sky was a traveler from outside the Dome.
“What year were you born?” he asked.
“I wasn’t born under the Aquian calendar,” she said evasively.
“Right. You were born in a cave,” he teased.
“A very nice cave,” Sky smiled. He didn’t seem to forget any of her stories. “Do you feel better now, or do you need something to soothe your stomach?”
“I want to try your chowder,” he said, starting to get up, then sinking into his seat again. Sky put a hand on his shoulder, then went to serve him a bowl. The chowder was warm and savory, and made good use of the tubers and pea pods they’d collected. There was a hint of beef protein flavor, but the chunks had melted in the cooking process. There were herbs and peppers that Hawk had never tasted before, because they didn’t grow in Rocan.
“Where are you?” Amanda moaned, leaning on Danny’s arm as he guided her into the galley. She wore fresh, but dingy coveralls and he’d repaired the strap on her splint.
“Look who’s up and about. Ready for lunch?” Sky smiled, bringing Hawk’s bowl to the table, then preparing two more.
“You don’t belong here,” Amanda murmured, speaking to the bulkhead rather than to any person.
“She’s going to lie down,” Danny said, steering Amanda around the chair and toeing open the door to his quarters.
“But the food’s ready. Eat, Danny,” Amanda said, squirreling out of his arms and kneeling on the bench, laser-focused on the steaming, purple chowder. Danny held her steady, waiting for the next shoe to drop. “Drink. This isn’t solid food.”
“Are your friends going to help us?” Danny asked.
“I haven’t heard from them, yet,” Sky replied. “Nothing, except the automated Vring telling us not to approach the city until we receive further instructions.”
“How long do you think we should give them?” Danny asked. “I realize a spaceship landing outside your door is a bold statement, but we don’t have forever. We either need help or we need to find a way to move on.”
“Let them stew another ten minutes while we eat and get our heads together,” Saskia said brusquely. With the seats at the table filling, Saskia took her meal leaning on the counter next to the fresh pot of bunna she was brewing. “The Captain and I can knock and see who answers.”
“I can go on this field trip. These people like me. Both sides in their own way,” Sky gushed. “The government factions are kind of wonky, but I have allies all around.”
“So we should go in armed?” Saskia asked, stirring the chowder, taking small bites.
“Absolutely,” Sky grinned. “These people have copper resources that could revitalize Quin’s industry.”
“I’m going with Sky,” Hawk added.
Amanda raised her spoon and watched the chowder slop off. “I have to see.”
“No, you’re going to stay here until you learn not to shoot the locals,” Danny told her.
“I did that one time!” Amanda protested. That one time had caused them a lot of trouble in Rocan. “I only did it once, right?”
“Every one of you is sick and likely to get caught in quarantine. I’ll go alone and wade through the initial pleasantries and let you know when we get through to a person who can bypass the droids,” Sky decided, dropping her dish in the sink. She mussed Hawk’s hair on her way out and trotted down the stairs, drawing her grav-gun and checking that it was on a low setting. She swung open the back door and a gust of hot, dusty air blew into the bay.
The land was dead.
“Well, this isn’t right,” Sky muttered, her weapon dropping to her side.
5
The dark, black Dome looked like a warped clay pot, the moonslate cracked and loose. Fine, white dust caught in the cracks, making it look like the entire Dome was covered with spider webs. “No wonder I’m not getting anything on the Vring.”
“What’s not right?” Danny asked, coming behind her.
“This. Where are we?” Sky stepped into the daylight, squinting at the garish reflection of the sunlight against the barren land. Even down the plateau’s edge, nothing grew, until the unnaturally sharp line of the forest edge. “That jungle is supposed to come all the way up here onto the plateau,” she explained. “Green and blue flowers everywhere, vines growing over the Dome. They open the gate twice a day to cut them back.”
It was twenty degrees warmer without the shade of the canopy, but the dark streaks through the doped moonslate told her this was Boone.
“I thought you brought us here because there was a clearing and we could land,” Danny said, circling Oriana, surveying the damage the drone collisions had caused. It was difficult to distinguish the new scorch marks from the old.
“This isn’t a clearing,” Sky cried. “This is a disaster! This can’t be. They’ve been watching Quin for decades. You can see the rockets launch on a clear day with a small telescope.”
This was one of the first places she’d come after she learned to speak Lanvarian. She’d all but shown them the way to Quin. “They’ve had their political issues, but this?”
She heard a whir, and then a greeter bot rolled through one of the cracks in the gate. It had large wheels, but a small body, and though it wasn’t much larger than a bread loaf, Sky knew it had defensive weapons. The bot went to Danny first, shining a wide, green beam as it scanned him.
“Unknown visitor. Quarantine required,” the bot reported in a smooth, female voice before trundling over to Sky. It scanned her, and Sky held her breath, forcing back tears at the confirmation that this was Boone. “Recognized Xentu affiliate. Welcome back.”
The bot retreated into the city, entering through a small, clean-cut opening.
“Looks like a blast came from inside the Dome,” Danny observed, using his Virp to scan the cracks on the gate.
“The droids are working,” Sky said. “Xentu droids. They’re the faction you want in charge.”
“How did they power the city?” Danny asked.
“Oil reserve. From what I understand, there’s a huge reserve under these mountains. They liked to brag that the city could easily last another thousand years,” Sky said, covering her mouth to keep a sob from escaping. After the Caldori war had forced Boone into isolation, they’d turned to fossil fuels out of desperation.
“They use fossil fuels, too?” Danny asked.
“And nuclear,” Sky recalled. “They have a nuclear plant.”
“Did we check for radiation?” Danny asked. “Do we still have sensors?”
Sky swayed in a breeze that wasn’t there, sickened by the scent of scorched metal and dust.
“Come on,” Danny coached, taking her hand, guiding her back up the ramp. “Back inside. Let’s double check.”
Saskia and Hawk were in the bay, Saskia forcing gloves onto Hawk’s hand.
“Not so friendly?” Saskia asked, drawing her stunner.
“Not
so living,” Danny said. “Nolwazi, are you getting radiation readings coming from the Dome?”
“Specify waveband,” Nolwazi replied. “Even you, Captain, emit infrared radiation.”
Danny groaned, continuing to argue with his computer.
Sky walked numbly into Hawk’s arms and hugged him. She’d stopped coming to Boone when their interests turned from science towards war, but even with the infighting, she’d never imagined this level of destruction.
Danny sat by Oriana’s bay door, controlling the Hull Crawler with his Virp, using the mechanical survey bot to scan for radiation. The ship’s hull offered radiation protection, but there were a growing number of holes in that shield of late. He took comfort from the fact that his skin hadn’t broken into boils from exposure.
Sky sat on the stairs, Hawk one step up massaging her shoulders, Amanda sitting between Sky’s legs, like a little sister. Sky had Hawk’s flask in hand, and had taken a few sips of tart, fresh-brewed, apple wine, but she hadn’t said a word in almost half an hour. Danny had once gone into the tunnels on Terrana and found an entire community of underground refugees slaughtered by fringe hunters. Although he’d come to help them, he didn’t know any of them personally, and he wasn’t left to wonder what happened to them like Sky was. But he felt he understood at least a little of her pain.
The Hull Crawler got stuck in the sand again. It was not an all-terrain rover, and Tray would throw a fit if it broke.
“No radiation,” Danny reported, opening the door again, letting in the desert air. “They didn’t die in a nuclear blast.”
“So how did they die?” Hawk asked. “Can you ask the ghosts?”
Danny sucked his cheeks in, not sure he knew enough about Hawk’s superstitions to respond respectfully. There were subcultures in Quin that believed they could channel spirits of the afterlife, and Danny’s religion wasn’t that far removed from those ideas. “We’re going to survey the damage to the ship. If we can manage repairs in house, we don’t have to disturb the city.”
“But we should go in, right?” Hawk said, patting Sky’s shoulder. “We should help put the ghosts to rest? Right, bébé?”
“I need to go into the city,” Sky whispered. “A droid greeted us. There may be survivors.”
“I need to go to the city,” Amanda echoed in Terranan. The conversation was in Trade up until that point—a language Amanda didn’t speak. Sky hugged Amanda around the neck and Amanda thumped her head against Sky’s knee. Danny could see the lucid moment passing, and he didn’t want her lashing out against Sky with Sky so fragile.
“Sky can get into the city,” Danny told Amanda. “The bot recognized her. We don’t know what kind of automated quarantine procedures the rest of us would face.”
“But she asked me to come,” Amanda whispered, scratching her forehead, tearing out bits of tangled hair. Danny took her hand, then cleared the broken hair from her fingers.
“Who? Who asked you to come?” Danny interrupted, taking her hand and clearing the broken hair from her fingers.
“She was on the bridge,” Amanda whined, her fingers flinching every time Danny’s finger brushed over a knuckle.
“Before you passed out?” he asked.
“Yes.” She rolled off the stairs and onto her knees, falling against Danny’s chest.
Whimpering, Sky let go of Amanda and leaned back on Hawk, gathering as much strength as she could.
“You saw the drones. Your Occ picked them up right before you were triggered,” Danny said, touching the device on Amanda’s brow. By the way she described it, it was a combination corrective optic, microscope, and telescope, and she was reluctant to part with it. Danny didn’t trust the device because he had no idea how it worked, but unless reading and reciting the fine print on every label on the ship counted as an adverse side effect, he couldn’t justify taking it from her.
“Triggered,” she repeated, choking on the word, resisting his implication that she’d imagined the stranger on the bridge.
“Right before you turned the ship to head for the drones. You turned because she asked you to come,” Danny said, back-pedaling to get her to talk about the delusion.
“No. It wasn’t me who turned. It was her,” Amanda insisted, leveraging his shoulder and teetering to her feet. “I didn’t want to come, but we’re here now because she wanted it. Because she…”
“She what?” Danny asked, standing with her, holding her elbows. “Who is she? What did she look like? What did she sound like? Did she say anything else?”
“Stop. Stop asking questions,” Amanda growled, digging her fingernails into his arms.
“I’m trying to understand.”
“No, you’re trying to make me understand why you don’t believe me!” she cried, clutching her head. Her knees buckled and he caught her, moving her back to the stairs so she could sit. “And you’re right. Stupid Occ finds things and shows them to me out of place. Out of context.”
She scratched at the device, but Sky stopped her.
“Don’t break it. There’s got to be a setting to make it stop adjusting focus,” Sky said. “Besides, you like having the super powers it gives you.”
“Speaking of which, let’s go outside,” Danny said. “I need those super eyes.”
“Are we going to the city?” Amanda asked hopefully.
“Eventually,” he promised. “You have to walk first.”
When Amanda didn’t get off the floor, Danny went outside without her and retrieved the Crawler. He slapped the sand out of the Crawler’s casing and attached it to the hull. The ship was in tatters and Danny peeled broken tiles away, collecting the large pieces, even though there was no hope of welding them back together.
Saskia emerged from the ship a few minutes later, shielding her eyes and looking to the sky, tracking the drones that had brought them down. There were only a few still flying.
“How is Tray?” Danny asked.
“Better than I expected. No major neck trauma, but the morphine has knocked him out,” she said, climbing onto the wing and manually exposing the solar panels. They were above the trees here, and out of the Dome’s shadow. The heat reflected off the barren land and off the hull.
“My eyes!” Amanda squealed, making a dash for the shade of the wing, then crouching on the ground. She pressed her palm into the dust, and Danny checked for signs of blood. She had a ritual of cutting her palm to summon her Elysian friend.
“Amanda, tell me how far this fracture goes,” Danny said, pointing to one of the larger gashes in the hull.
Amanda squinted, then squeaked, rolling onto her back and covering her eyes.
“Did you hurt your eyes?” Danny checked. He’d assumed the Occ would provide her sun protection.
“Scared myself,” Amanda murmured.
“There’s a pointer on your Virp. Show me how far the fracture goes. We can plug the hole, but I need to know how far to reinforce,” Danny prompted. The Hull Crawler could catalog the damage better than Amanda could with the Occ, but he could see he was losing her, and hoped engaging her would forestall the breakdown. Her feet twitched and she rolled again, matting the dust in her hair.
“I need to find her,” Amanda groused, stamping her foot, sending up a cloud of dust.
“Use the pointer,” Danny said again.
Amanda smacked her Virp, activating a green pointer and traced the microscopic fracture. “There. The fracture goes this way up to there.”
“Thank you,” Danny said, marking the section as needing reinforcement.
Amanda slapped her neck and rolled onto her stomach, whining.
“Stay with me. We have the rest of the ship to do,” Danny said, switching from Lanvarian to Terranan. When she had these episodes, he didn’t know whether to hold her down or keep his distance.
“Why are you saying that?” Amanda whined, tearing at her hair, choking on the dirt that coated her face.
“Damn!” Saskia swore. “Cap, didn’t the Aux 2 fuel tank read full
?”
“Yes! I thought you sealed the sub-chambers from each other,” Danny said, coming to stern where the real damage was. The temporary patch they’d put on while in space had degraded.
“This chamber’s almost empty,” Saskia said.
“What?” Danny cried, linking his Virp to the shipboard sensors. “No! We need that fuel! Check the other tanks.”
“Looks like we still have Aux 1—”
Amanda screeched, cutting off Saskia’s report. She thrashed and kicked, slamming her face against the ground. They needed to get her home before they ran out of fuel.
“Should we take her inside?” Saskia sighed.
“She’ll just hurt herself more if there’s furniture around,” Danny said, rubbing his ears. “What was that song she was singing earlier? Do you know it? Maybe it’ll soothe her.”
“I don’t think she can hear us right now,” Saskia said.
6
“Ow! Ow!” fourteen-year-old Tray cried as the family doctor tended his wounded fingers. His father sat by his pillow, stroking his cheek, but Tray feared the gentle touch would become a slap if he let even a single tear fall. The doctor gave him a local anesthetic, and continued to knit Tray’s bleeding fingers.
“I’m sorry, daddy,” Tray sniffled, his body tensing, his teeth grinding.
“Tell me why you ran away, son,” Steven Hale whispered, his eyes on Tray’s hand. He wore a non-descript gray vest and satin-smooth argyle gloves, identifying him as a business owner without being so flashy as to call himself elite. His dark skin, rounded jaw, and close-cropped hair added to his decision to appear average, though Tray knew his father had the money of an aristocrat and the means of a crime boss.
“I wasn’t running away. I was taken from school,” Tray insisted.
“You weren’t even in Clover when the kidnappers took you,” Steven countered, his voice even, but threatening. When Tray witnessed his father murder his captors, any doubt he had that his father could and would carry out a threat of punishment had vanished. “You’d already crossed Olcott Bay and had a ticket to Kemah. Are you telling me the kidnappers bought a ticket in your name?”
Hybrid: A Space Opera Adventure Series (The New Dawn Book 4) Page 5
