His face crumpling, Tray tossed the blanket at Danny, then flipped onto his stomach, burying his face in the pillow. Danny tucked it around Hawk, glad when Hawk stirred slightly. Danny stretched Hawk’s legs, arranging him under the blanket, and Hawk went stiff. His face crumpled, like he was trying to process a bad dream.
“Non,” Hawk grunted, twisting away when Danny lifted his head to place a pillow. Hawk’s feet tangled in the blanket as he kicked it off.
“If he doesn’t want it, I want it back,” Tray said.
Hawk shouted something in Rocanese, then started coughing so hard that he collapsed face first onto the floor.
“It’s okay, Hawk,” Danny said, leaning over the man. When he touched Hawk’s shoulder, Hawk lashed out. Danny caught Hawk’s arm and twisted it behind his back. “Calm down. Do you understand?”
“Non soumistanne!” Hawk cried out, choking on his own breath. His lips and cheeks turned bright red, and he struggled against Danny’s pin hold.
“Danny, let go of him,” Tray groaned.
“He’s going to hurt himself,” Danny said. “This room is too small for him to throw a tantrum.”
“He’s throwing it whether you want him to or not,” Tray argued.
“Tray, help me,” Danny begged.
Tray opened his mouth, then made a face. He strutted confidently, getting into Hawk’s face, and he glared. It was the same glare that Steven used on them when they were kids and misbehaving. Hawk froze and fell to his knees, staring up at Tray, jaw quivering, his eyes wide.
“You like that head on your shoulders, don’t you?” Tray warned, his voice barely audible above the ventilation fans.
Danny couldn’t tell if Hawk nodded, but the poor guy trembled badly.
“You don’t want it exploding?” Tray continued.
“Non!” Hawk sobbed softly, keeping his hand clamped over his ear.
“Tray, don’t say things like that!” Danny said. Tray turned his glare on Danny and Danny backed down. Even after all this time, Danny was terrified of his stepfather, and Tray had that same threatening look in his eyes. Steven had disowned Danny and sent him to live on the streets. Danny had no illusions about the business he now shared with his brother. He was dependent on Tray, and that look made Danny afraid—one wrong move and his brother would leave him. “Don’t say it. He believes you,” Danny implored.
“That’s what makes it funny,” Tray smirked.
“Hawk, your head is not going to explode,” Danny said.
“Drink. You’re dehydrated,” Tray said, handing Hawk a canteen of water. Hawk took a sip and made a face, then looked pleadingly at Tray. “You can have wine when you finish that,” Tray said.
Hawk took another sip, nearly dropping the canteen, he was shaking so badly.
“I’m going to refrain from exploding your head, because we need you,” Tray continued. “We need your help to get out of here. We can’t use our devices to power this room forever. I’m thinking we can cannibalize a droid power source, and maybe find a way to keep the ship cool while we … wait for rescue. That’s all we can do, I guess. Twiddle our thumbs and wait for the rain to let up.”
“It’s not your fault, you know,” Danny said quickly, putting a hand on his brother’s shoulder. “I would have tried to take off, too.”
Tray brushed Danny’s hand away, his stony expression growing icier by the second. “If we don’t find a way to use the droids as a power source, we’re not going to survive this heat wave long enough for it to matter.”
“What do you want me to do, Tray? Pray for a miracle?” Danny asked sharply. “I’m already doing that.”
The hatch opened, and Amanda came in, carrying a box of nut-bars and a thermos of coffee. She handed the thermos to Danny, then gave Hawk one of the nut-bars. Saskia slipped in behind her, her long black hair sopping wet, her dripping clothes clinging to her body.
Hawk tapped Tray with his canteen.
“Wine’s over there,” Tray said, pointing to the jug on the floor. Hawk scampered over, pouring the wine into his canteen, shooting wary looks at Danny and Tray.
“Soumis esclavenne now?” Hawk asked, mixing Rocanese with Trade.
“I don’t know that word. Do you?” Danny asked, looking to Tray.
“Nope,” Tray said.
“Pourqui?”
“Why. That’s ‘why,’” Danny translated.
“Why,” Hawk repeated in Trade. “Why are we here? In here?”
“We lost electrical power on the ship. This was the only room we could afford to cool for the night,” Danny reminded him. Because of the rain and darkness yesterday, they’d prioritized the quick fix of directing existing power to this room. He pointed to the thermal blanket wadded on the mattresses. “Everyone came down here.”
“Everyone?” Hawk whispered in horror. “All… maitrennes?”
“I’m sorry. I don’t know what you’re asking,” Danny said, his lips pursing in frustration.
“The external damage is worse than we thought,” Saskia interrupted. “It looks like the solar panel took a direct lightning strike. It’s useless now. The rigs we made to tap the battery work, but without a solar panel, we can’t recharge.”
“I fix sun-brick. Easy,” Hawk piped up, cowering behind his drink when the others looked at him.
“He’s having trouble with words?” Saskia asked, approaching him swiftly. Hawk looked petrified, but he stayed frozen as she felt his neck. Even from across the room, Danny could see the swollen glands. “If we had power, I’d do a brain scan. I think you were pretty close to a heat stroke last night. May have actually had one. How are you feeling?”
Hawk furrowed his brow, looking from her to Tray to Danny, then ducking his eyes. Danny wished he knew Rocanese well enough to try translating the question. Catching his chin, Saskia directed his gaze so that their eyes met.
“Point to where it hurts,” Saskia directed.
Hawk tried to look away again, but Saskia wouldn’t let go of his chin. His hand moved over the lower part of his abdomen. He winced even at the slight brush of his own fingers, and he yelped when Saskia pressed two fingers to that.
“Kidney. Not your stomach anymore?” Saskia asked. “That’s not good.”
“Is it okay for him to eat that protein block?” Tray asked. “He can usually stomach the raw block.”
“I fix sun-brick?” Hawk asked, his voice hoarse. He gulped down more of the wine.
“Hawk, drink some water. Get your language skills back, then we’ll talk,” Tray said.
“You can’t fix ‘fried.’ You can’t build a new solar panel,” Danny agreed. “And nothing in Brandon’s workshop can help.”
“He doesn’t need to build them,” Amanda said. She spoke Lanvarian, letting the Virp to translate her words to Trade. Danny hadn’t realized she was following the conversation. More to the point, he often forgot that she didn’t follow Trade conversations without help. “We can salvage some and wire them in. Boone has plenty of solar panels. Sky pointed them out when we were touring the city.”
“You didn’t mention this last night?” Tray grumbled.
“Sanity lapse,” Amanda quipped. “Also, the sun wasn’t out.”
“It’s worth a shot,” Saskia agreed.”
“If we fix it, won’t the drones just destroy it again?” Danny asked.
“No, that point went to Sea’iqa,” Tray said.
“What choice do we have?” Saskia asked. “Even if we got a signal to Quin today, we have to assume it would take time for them to decide to mount a rescue. We’re here at least a few days waiting for rescue, and our battery power only gets us through this afternoon.”
18
Tray sat on the stairs, kicking himself for thinking he could fly Oriana on his own. Between his abuse of the fuel and the lightning strike on the solar panel, the ship was dead on the ground. Like it or not, they were headed back into Boone.
“What are you doing?” Saskia asked. She and Hawk waited by the back door, an
d the rain beat so hard, they couldn’t see ten feet out. It was dark out, even though it was morning, and the noise of the wind and rain filled the cargo bay.
“Sèche vite,” Hawk said, completely disrobing and charging into the rain.
“I don’t want to be naked,” Amanda murmured, sitting next to Tray on the stairs.
“I have dry clothes for you in here,” Tray said, kicking the watertight container that he’d packed. Rolling the crate across the bay, he added Hawk’s shed clothing, then stripped off his shirt and put it in. He didn’t want to wear a wet shirt all morning. “Let’s go.”
Tray took the first step into the rain, turned his face upward, and let it rinse away the dirt and grime that had been building over the past few days. With the air so warm, the rainfall felt like a hot shower. He spread his arms, letting the water blast over his skin, nearly falling into the mud when the wind gusted.
Stifling a laugh, Saskia hooked his arm and tugged him toward the gate. They were sopping wet by the time they made it through, and they nearly tripped over Hawk, who was curled in a ball on the ground, panting for breath. A greeter bot and nurse bot circled him, sensors extended.
“Take cover!” Saskia warned, pushing Tray backward into Danny and Amanda.
“Don’t fire at the nurse bot. It’s trying to help,” Tray said, pushing her weapon down. “Hawk, did the drones attack?”
Hawk shook his head, gasping and clutching his stomach.
“Don’t tell me you slipped,” Tray said, digging a towel from his crate and covering Hawk. Hawk reeled at the contact, rolled onto his knees, and puked. It was mostly clear liquid that came up.
“Couru—run too vite,” Hawk panted, pulling the towel around his waist as he sat up. “Made my… calcul hurt.”
“Calcul?” Danny asked. He held his towel like a curtain for Amanda, letting her change first.
“Stone,” Saskia explained. “Kidney stone. I can’t treat it with anything battery powered. We have to fix the electrics first, then I can break it up.”
Tray scratched his head and sat on the ground. He could already feel the mud glopped against his feet, undoing the cleansing effect of the rain. It almost wasn’t worth it to change into dry clothes, knowing they’d be soiled as well.
An ambulance bot rolled up and a flashing blue light indicated that it had exchanged information with the nurse bot about the patient. “Do you require transport?” the bot asked, a gurney expanding from its midsection.
“No, thank you. We can handle him,” Tray said, watching curiously as the gurney continued to extend. It leveraged the wheels already used by the bot, and the gurney itself seemed to be made of some kind of canvas. He could have used a bot like this to get Saskia back to the ship the other day. “You wouldn’t happen to know where we can get solar cells, batteries, portable air cooling units, or, dare I ask, antibiotics?”
The ambulance bot flashed its blue light again, lowering the height of the gurney to make it easier to load the patient. Hawk crawled on, fascinated by the machine. He poked his finger at the gurney as it elevated.
The greeter bot flashed a green light. “Fans and free-standing air-cooling units are available at building G-13. Photovoltaic cells, batteries, and antibiotics are available in major retail and supply stores in the commerce district.”
“What about drone control?” Tray asked. “Is there a central location where the drones are controlled?”
“Security clearance is required,” the greeter responded.
Danny snickered and set Hawk’s clothes on the gurney for him.
“Had to ask,” Tray shrugged.
“Hawk, you and Tray go check out this G-13 building,” Danny suggested.
“Why?” Hawk asked, ringing out his long hair, hopping off the gurney. Hawk’s hair did not knot like Tray’s, it seemed to get smoother and finer the longer he let it be.
“You collapsed after a fifty-yard dash. I’m not letting you on the roof of a building,” Danny said.
“What if Liza comes after him?” Amanda asked.
“Tell her to stick around. I’d like to meet her,” Danny said.
Danny laid back on the roof of the building, positioning himself under the leaky part of the Dome, opening his mouth to catch the rainwater. After three hours of harvesting solar panels, he needed a break. Whatever the locals had used to fortify the Dome structure, it didn’t let any natural light in, and with the cloud cover and rain outside, there was little light coming through the cracks. The solar panel they’d pulled off this roof was small, and didn’t appear functional.
“At least the sun isn’t out,” Amanda said, sitting next to him, cupping her hand to catch the rainwater, then letting it flow down her arms.
“Did you ever wonder what these solar panels are doing inside the Dome?” Danny asked.
“Not at all,” Amanda said. “They’re here. They’re useful. And it doesn’t seem that I’m depriving someone else of life by taking them.”
“The positioning suggests that they were laid here after these cracks formed in the Dome,” Danny said, studying the opening above them. “There’s no solar farm outside the city. Sky said this place used to be overgrown with vines and the encroaching jungle.”
“So?” Amanda asked, splashing the water onto her face, then onto his.
“So why is solar panel acquisition part of bot programming?” Danny asked. “Unless the cracks came before the death of all the people.”
Amanda slipped off her shoes and rinsed her feet. “Why do you like to think so much?” she asked.
Danny smiled and stood up. The roof was hot, and sitting on it made Danny’s skin burn. “When you understand the bigger picture, it’s easier to get out of a situation. Something in this city is keeping us from leaving. If it’s related to the machines, then we need to understand how they get their information.”
“The bot didn’t say solar cells. It used a science word,” Amanda said, shifting to sit on his feet.
“Photovoltaic,” Danny recalled. “Good point. Maybe it was talking about something small scale that used the light in the Dome. Maybe that’s why they stopped doping the Dome with avalan—it affected the light. That still doesn’t explain the alignment with the cracks.”
Shaking his head, he looked down to the street where the droids were lined up waiting to be serviced by a human who wasn’t there. The bots that still worked swept away footprints in the dust. The drones made crisscross patterns through the air, dense enough to be disturbing, but not so dense as to block the view of the sky.
“How do Domes usually have light in bad weather?” Amanda asked, tracing one of the drone paths with her finger. Their flight pattern was changing. “Are they supposed to have GLO-tech?”
“It varies from city to city,” Danny said. “There’s no obvious signs of lighting technology integrated into the Dome wall, and I doubt scavengers would have been so thorough. If there had ever been GLO-tech, there would at least be broken luminators left behind. There’s no sign of street lamps, but it’s possible those got knocked over in whatever explosion took out the rest of the city.”
“Captain!” Saskia cried. She stood at ground level, facing off with a droid who had drawn itself up to six feet high. Ten drones swarmed in, creating a net around her.
“Now what?” Danny muttered, drawing his pulse rifle. At least he had the higher ground of the roof.
“Don’t fire,” Amanda said, laying flat on the roof, peering over the edge. “If you want to see the bigger picture, you can’t force them to defensive action at every encounter.”
Danny tapped his Feather. “Saskia, any idea what they want?”
He waited, but got no response.
“She’s standing,” Amanda said, activating her Occ. “The Occ is showing me some kind of energy field around her. She probably can’t get your message.”
The drone position shifted, and they moved Saskia down the street. The droid stayed at full height, leading the way.
“Let
’s go,” Amanda said, pulling her knees into a tuck, preparing to jump.
“Gravity!” Danny hissed, grabbing her arm. “You’re not on Terrana anymore. A fall from this height will break your neck.”
Amanda sighed and rolled her eyes. “I hate gravity.”
Chuckling, Danny started their descent from the roof. Taking Amanda’s hand, he swung her through the highest window. He turned, letting his feet dangle over the edge, and Amanda took his ankles, guiding his feet to the ledge of the window so he knew where to drop. Once inside, they took the stairs down. The stairway was stone and rickety, and the more Danny thought about it, the more he realized it, too, was added after the destruction of the city, probably to get the solar panels onto the roof. There was a metal fan on the lower level, attached to newer wiring. Everything seemed to confirm there were survivors, except the complete lack of life.
“This way,” Amanda said, taking his elbow, pulling him down the street, keeping one hand on her temple as she used the Occ to track Saskia. The entourage moved slowly, and Danny and Amanda caught up after a few blocks. The droid took Saskia into a building, and the drones quickly dispersed.
“This might be a police station,” Danny observed, approaching the building.
A droid intercepted them at the front door. In its compacted form, it stood about three feet high. “State your business,” it said, blocking their path.
“I… wish to post bail for the woman you just brought it,” Danny said.
The droid’s height increased a few inches. “Bail protocol not recognized. Please step back.”
Danny stepped back, putting Amanda behind him. “Has she been charged with a crime?” he asked.
“Multiple vandalism fines, exceeding maximum limit,” the droid replied.
“I wish to pay her fines,” Danny said.
“Specify account,” the droid said.
Danny stuttered and took another step back.
“Aurelia,” Amanda spoke up, using the name Sky had given.
“Voice print not recognized,” the droid said, increasing its height again, a panel sliding back, the barrel of a weapon protruding.
Hybrid: A Space Opera Adventure Series (The New Dawn Book 4) Page 16
