Surely no one lived here now?
“In here,” Chrystal called out loud.
He followed her voice to the right. She stood in front of a long window, clearly meant as a viewing chamber. Inside, row upon neat row of metal beds with straps. Identical banks of machines sat near all of the beds. They reminded him very much of a hospital. Or maybe of the place where they had been created. His memories of that were hazy, impeded by the drugs the Next had given them.
They disturbed him at a deep, visceral level.
Chrystal spoke the thing he had been thinking. This must be the place where they created the first Next. We know it happened on Lym, right?
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
CHARLIE
By the time he entered Ice Fall Valley, rain fell so hard Charlie had to fly slowly and high just to be sure he wouldn’t accidentally go off course. “Left,” Gerry steered him remotely by voice, and then, “Right a degree, now straight.” At one point she even said, “There’s lightning, but it’s behind you. I’ll let you know if it comes closer.”
Gerry guided him to a landing spot near the front of Amfi’s cave, taking him through such a thick miasma of water and fog that he could only see three feet in front of the skimmer’s drenched window. When he finally landed safely, he let out a long sigh of relief. “Thank you. I would have had to hole up and wait this out.”
“You’re welcome. I’m going to the bathroom.” With that, she closed the connection, and he laughed and counted himself lucky for her friendship.
It was only late afternoon, but the thick clouds made it look and feel like dusk. By the time he trudged through the muddy path and made his way behind the wide waterfall, he was soaked head to foot.
Luckily, Amfi knew to expect him, and she stood with the door open, waiting for him. She handed him a thin, hand-woven red wrap and turned her back and made him strip and hand her his wet clothes. So he walked into the common galley dressed oddly, with his hair soaked and his feet bare.
Losianna giggled, but he forgave her after she brought him a pair of warm socks.
Amfi fed him soup before she took a long look at him and said, “I thought I was supposed to be spying for you, and that you’d take care of Manny.”
“They stuck this shield over Nexity after the attack. It had always been there, I guess, but just over the city. Even though air passed through, it just . . . I don’t know . . . it made me feel like a trapped animal.”
“I bet.” She brought him tea and some of Davis’s old clothes. They were too big for him, but he felt happier dressed in something more substantial.
“So you were spying for me. What did you find?”
She shook her head. “Only that Kyle isn’t here. He’s running around looking for recruits. I think he’s lost a few.”
“Two came back to Wilding Station. They’re doing the work they’re supposed to be doing.”
“Good.” She grinned, and glanced at Losianna. “I told you what I learned, but Losianna learned more.”
He raised an eyebrow and looked at the pale girl.
She fidgeted, full of whatever secret she held. Her voice came out small and determined. “Gleaners meet sometimes and in some places.” She looked up at him through pale eyelashes. “This isn’t for other people to know, though. It wouldn’t be safe for us for people to know we get into groups.”
“I’ll keep your secret.”
“Thank you. Three bands met. Two big ones and a family band, just three people. The family had come from the sea, from the far north. They have instruments that record the comings and goings of ships. One of the old men, he does this as a hobby. Benton Lindy’s his name. He always has watched ships. Doesn’t trust them, and thinks if he knows what’s coming and going he can keep his family safe. He’s the reason I went to this gathering.”
Once again she stopped, watching him expectantly, so he said, “I understand.”
“He said there’s ships and ships and ships—tens of ships or more, all landing on Entare, near Palat. A little south of it, at the old ranger station.”
“That must be Desert Bow Station,” Charlie offered, “The Next have permission to build a city at Iron’s Reach, which is close by. They’ve already started, so it could be them.”
“Benton is absolutely convinced they’re not using the Port Authority docking stations. He said they’re coming and going from ships. Ships!”
Charlie sat back and thought about it a little. “Why does that mean they’re not Next?”
“Benton saw the insignia on one. It’s Gunnar Ellensson’s.”
He stiffened, suddenly cold to his marrow. “Are they sure?”
“Yes.”
Gunnar was never good news. What would he be doing on Entare? The huge continent was a restricted destination full of ruins and restored desert hills, most of its vast middle a dry and difficult place. There were minerals there, but surely Gunnar wasn’t sneaking in a back door to mine Lym. Even he was not so mercenary. Or so stupid.
“Did you learn anything about what those might be up to? What cargo they have, for example?”
She poked at the fire with a stick. “I told you everything I know.”
“Thank you. I appreciate your willingness to share information.”
“Well,” she said. “Everybody’s upset. I figured you rangers might be more able than us to make sense of Gunnar being here, if it is him. I believe Benton, but I didn’t see anything myself.”
Charlie shook his head and set the information aside for the moment. There was no reason to alarm Amfi, and no way to call Nona from inside the cave. He’d see her in a day or two anyway. He could already feel her in his arms, see her face spangled by spray from a waterfall, hear her laugh in sheer joy at the beauty of being alive.
Maybe she’d know what Gunnar was up to.
The next morning, he set an early alarm. To his surprise, he found the kitchen already flickering with light. Losianna sat by a banked cooking fire with her legs crossed, daintily sipping at a steaming drink that smelled of sweet bark and nutmeg. “Good morning.” She lifted her cup. “Would you like some?”
“I have to run an errand.”
“Don’t you need something to eat first?”
“I have some supplies in the skimmer.” Although nothing in the skimmer was fresh. He should take her up on her offer.
“I’d like to talk with you for a minute,” she said, her head tilted so the firelight played across her face.
He felt cautious. “All right.”
She moved about the kitchen like a wisp of efficient fog, and before long he had a steaming cup of exactly what she was drinking in front of him, as well as toasted flatbread with tree nuts baked into it and a sweet jam spread on top. He bit into the bread, immediately grateful that she had talked him into staying. “This is fabulous.”
Her cheeks flushed ever so slightly as she moved her cup and took a seat at the table opposite him. “It just came out of the oven.”
“How long have you been up?”
“A few hours. Look, you don’t mind?”
Odd that this woman who shot two people with no particularly obvious guilt was so nervous to have a simple conversation with him. “Anything. Go ahead and ask.”
“You spent time with Jason and Yi on your way down here, right? You flew here. A whole space journey worth of time?”
“Yes. And Chrystal, at least at first. It was me and Nona, Chrystal, Jason, and Yi. They were newer then, fresher. In some ways they were still discovering what happened to them.”
“Aren’t they still? Jason told me he wakes up and discovers he’s a little different every day, that he’s . . . deeper.”
Charlie shrugged. “I’ve been watching Yi. The first Yi—the one who flew with me. He’s smart. Every time I see him he’s become better at being a robot. The others are struggling more—even Chrystal struggled some. But Yi is happy. He’s going to be a Jhailing. Well—a Yi. But like that. I’ve no doubt at all.”
“What does that mean?”
“He’ll transcend himself. I think maybe what they become is very mystical.”
She smiled. “Isn’t that what we all want? To understand the world?”
“It also means he’ll be inside their circle.”
She sipped at her tea. “But Jason. Will he be like that? Transcendent?”
He remembered that she possibly fancied herself in love with Jason and decided to be blunt. “If he stops wishing he were dead. Jason is living in the past and eating old hurts in place of food. That’s a place for old humans, not new robots.”
“Do you want to be one? Ever? Even when you’re old?”
He shivered. “Never. The time I spent in space was enough. And the time I spent with them taught me how tortured they are. Even the Chrystal who died, she was tortured about what she had lost. Remember, they have no children, no sex, no simple physical pleasures like a deep breath. That tea you’re drinking? You would never taste it again. This bread—which is delicious by the way—you would never have it again. You would never sleep, never dream, never cook or eat a meal.”
Losianna laughed. “So I would be done with the work of living?”
“And all of the happiness.” He frowned. “Chrystal often spoke of how they were murdered.”
“So she lived in the past, too?”
He shook his head. “Not like Jason. She accepted what she had become. I think it’s possible to embrace a new life and still mourn an old one.” All of the philosophy was making him profoundly uncomfortable. He took the last bite of bread. “I need to go.”
She reached a hand out for his plate. “Will you take me with you?”
“I’m just going to do some rangering. There’s a place I need to check on.”
“I’d like a chance to get out of the cave.”
Maybe he shouldn’t go at all. He tried to think it through. If he refused her and then walked in with the soulbots, he’d feel bad. If he took her, and he didn’t find the soulbots, then no harm would happen except he’d have to try to explain why he was tromping around in caves. If he took her and he found them, then that really wouldn’t cause any problem either, not that he could think of. Except that his instincts about trouble had woken up as soon as Gerry showed him that footage.
Losianna sat quietly, waiting for his answer. She was frustratingly naive, and right now she looked lonely and vulnerable.
“All right.”
Fifteen minutes later, they had left a note for Amfi and were on their way. He’d collected the coordinates by mapping the video against one of the more precise geography programs that the skimmer used for navigation. “We’ll be in the air for about half an hour.”
“All right.” She peered out the window, apparently completely entranced with a landscape that she surely knew well. But then, the sun was just kissing the canyon awake. It had freed itself from the bottom edge of ridge it rose over, which meant a line of light bisected the jutting stone walls and patches of thick forest just above them and the water of the myriad falls fell from bright light into shadow and down to a still-dark river.
He took them all the way up through the line of bright light and over a ridge, which they flew parallel to. After about three minutes, his nav computer nudged him to the right and he followed a thin dry streambed that wound through scrub trees.
“It’s amazing how different it is just over a single ridge,” she said. “It’s so easy to forget.”
“Have you been over here before?”
“Sure. I’ve climbed both sides of the valley a few times.”
A reminder that gleaners were travelers at heart and that staying in the cave was unlike them. Perhaps she’d spoken a simple truth when she asked for the opportunity to leave the cave. Maybe being inside four walls was as hard for her as being inside of a tin can in space was for him. He banked the skimmer. “Watch for a cave.”
“I don’t want another cave.”
“This one’s probably smaller.”
She frowned at him. Nevertheless, she spotted the opening first. “There?”
He circled. It looked right. They’d have to land to really tell. Of course, everything nearby was boulders and small folded ridges and trees and sharp ravines. He couldn’t recall the last flat place he’d seen.
She squinted down below them. “Is it big enough to land in?”
He glanced down at it. The skimmer would easily fit inside the wide mouth. The floor looked flat. “I don’t know.” It wasn’t his preference. But he didn’t want to walk six clicks from the next nearest flat place either. “It’s a risk.”
“Can you go really slowly?”
He overflew another time, nervous. He queried the nav and had it plot a trajectory. There would be room to turn around. “We’ll try it.”
As he flew in, the cave transitioned from rocky mouth to a smooth, almost featureless cylinder with a hard, flat bottom. The nav AI helped him complete the turn, so the skimmer sat at the very edge of the cave with the nose pointing outward.
He set the brakes and climbed out, helping Losianna out after him.
Birds twittered outside, although the cave naturally muffled them so it seemed like he and Losianna and the skimmer had been captured by a tunnel. When she said, “So now what?” her voice sounded unnaturally loud.
They stood on a hard surface. He walked them toward the entrance and found footprints in the dirt. Not that he truly needed the confirmation; as soon as he saw the smooth walls he’d been convinced he’d found their target.
The soulbots were nowhere to be seen. “Now we wait.”
“What are you waiting for?”
He shook his head. “If it comes, you’ll see. In the meantime, this is a beautiful place to watch the day come alive. We’re safe and warm, and we can explore the area right around here. I’d like to record the plant life.”
“You rangers are always recording and poking and prodding. Why don’t you leave well enough alone?”
Another sign that she was young. “We destroyed this place. Humans. We’re rebuilding it. It still needs a hand here and there. We have to manage invasive species and protect animals that we’ve recently brought back and make sure they get a good start.”
The look on her face suggested he was boring her. “Here, help me count?” She stood still, looking out over the misty, ridged landscape.
“Do you want me to take you back?” he asked.
“No.” She came over and stood close to him. “Tell me what to do.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
NONA
On the day of Nona and Amanda’s departure, they walked together toward the spaceport. Puddles of water left behind by night rain reflected the blue sky and wheeling birds. Nona splashed lightly in a few of the puddles, enchanted by the still water.
“You’re like a kid with the puddles,” Amanda observed.
“I didn’t have puddles as a kid. It’s not like we leave water lying about on space stations.”
“There must be a lot you don’t have in space.”
“I miss the concerts, and the food. We have such a variety of food. You don’t allow any of it here, but people have made so many new spices and vegetables. Even the pastes can taste like heaven.”
Amanda looked surprised. “I always heard we had better food.”
“You do,” Nona said. “Fresher anyway. But not nearly the variety. There’s a lot of bored people on stations trying to get rich with the next culinary sensation.”
“Oh.”
“I did choose to be here, remember?” They were getting near the town gates. “I’ve never been to the farms.”
Amanda smiled wanly.
Nona returned the smile and whispered, “We’ll find Amy if we can.”
“I know.”
She should have known Jules wouldn’t allow Amanda to leave without some ceremony over it. So she and Amanda stood behind him on a small stage while he made a short speech about the unity in Lym, as if he hadn’t noticed the planet was
as united as shattered glass. Thankfully, he didn’t offer her a chance to talk but instead just mentioned that the embassy would be closed while Nona traveled with Amanda to visit the farms.
Only ten people had shown up for the speech, and they clapped politely as he dismounted from the makeshift stage.
Jules stayed behind, but two of his bicycle security guards rode down the main street in front of them, just fast enough to make Nona and Amanda walk too quickly to talk. Behind them there were five more bicycle guards.
This ridiculous line of people and bicycles took one whole side of the street. Amanda leaned over and whispered into Nona’s ear. “Jules is making sure everyone knows we’re going off to save the runaway children. He thinks forcing people to watch us leave is leadership.”
Jules seemed determined to order people around, and the looks on the bicycle guards’ faces suggested they didn’t enjoy their duties. She couldn’t imagine Manny ordering anyone to do anything, although, to be fair, she’d never spent much time in Manna Springs before.
The florist stood outside of his shop and offered Nona and Amanda each a spray of yellow bell flowers wrapped in red and green foliage, which they took.
When they climbed into the largest skimmer she could see out in the open anywhere, the Storm, Nona spotted Jean Paul and Farro in the front two seats. She smiled a greeting and turned around and waved at the bicycle brigade, watching them ride slowly away.
“That was strange,” she said to Amanda, who sat beside her near the front.
Amanda sighed. “Jules always wanted to run the ranger brigades when he grew up. This is his chance to tell people what to do.”
Nona took the opportunity to ask, “How did you two end up in charge anyway?”
Amanda sat back. “There are twelve first families left on Lym. We make the decisions, usually by consensus, but when we can’t get one, we vote. Manny and Charlie are both Windars, of course, and so they didn’t get a vote. Out of the other eleven, only us and the Patels were interested, and we won by one vote. I wish we had lost.”
Jean Paul leaned over the seat. “Better you than them.” He spoke to Nona. “The Patels are too nice. At least Jules hasn’t let the Port Authority completely overrun the town.”
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