by T. M. Catron
When he finished, he looked at her and said, “It’s their genetic code. Now we don’t need the young Glyph."
“Lincoln,” Alvarez said quietly. “Come over here a minute.”
Lincoln walked around the workbench to look over her shoulder at her screen. They had set up inside the training room, which was stuffed full of hybrids working on holographic keyboards. The hybrids had gathered human technology for years, so when Grace had found a storage room with mountains of boxes of computer components, Lincoln’s team had jumped at them. They had then uploaded their own program from Nelson’s saved data drive and were currently adapting it to read the adarria on the walls of the training room.
Grace and others had been helping them establish patterns by interpreting for them. But even with her help, they were running into problems. The alien symbols had so many variations and overlap that isolating them was like trying to chase individual water droplets falling into a river.
At the moment, Grace had stepped away to speak with another hybrid. She kept her eyes on them, however, always anticipating trouble.
Lincoln doubted she could fend off all the hybrids now if they attacked, but all seemed to be working, not paying any attention to the humans. And Lincoln didn’t care, as long as he kept his mind off Mina’s disappearance. Grace had traced his sister’s steps and told him she suspected that Mina had gone with Doyle.
Lincoln felt betrayed, somehow. Not surprised, but disappointed and angry all the same. The least Mina could have done was say goodbye. She hadn’t even done that.
“When we designed this program,” Alvarez whispered after he hobbled around the table to her, “we anticipated that we might not be interpreting speech.”
“And?” Lincoln lowered his voice so Grace didn’t hear.
“What we didn’t anticipate was having so many variations to the symbols.”
“That tripped us up in the mines.”
“Yes, even with being able to run the program on it now, and with the hybrids’ help, it’s going to take a long time to create a lexicon.”
Lincoln caught Alvarez’s eye. “How long?”
“We could be here for years.”
Lincoln looked back at the screen, at an open window that showed an estimation of their progress. She was right, of course, but Lincoln hadn’t wanted to think about it.
“We don’t have years. The aliens are looking for this ship right now.”
“You know the numbers as well as I.”
Lincoln brought his fist down on the table, causing Alvarez to jump, and several hybrids around them looked up.
Alvarez gave him a puzzled look. “What did you expect, Lincoln? That all this would be solved in a few days?”
“I expected more progress!” he hissed.
“Chill, Lincoln,” Nelson said from his corner of the table. They were his first words in twelve hours. He frowned at his own screen, not typing, just staring as if what he was seeing wasn’t really there.
“I am chill,” Lincoln said hotly. “But it seems like I’m the only one around here who actually cares that this gets done.”
Alvarez stood. Her chair skidded back and fell over with a clang. “Absolutely, Lincoln, because we’re not doing enough! You are right. The fate of the Earth isn’t as important to us as it is to you. Here, pick up my seat and see if you can make the process any faster!”
Lincoln glared at her.
She crossed her arms. “Well?”
Grace finally walked over to see what the fuss was about, although Lincoln suspected she’d already heard most of the argument.
“You all have been great,” she said.
Lincoln, Alvarez, Nelson, and Carter all scoffed.
Grace frowned at their disbelief. “No, really. The hybrids had never created a program like this because we had always been able to talk to the adarria. But all of our combined power can’t control the Factory like Doyle can. This program is saving us a lot of time.”
“And all of your combined insight can’t make it learn faster?” Lincoln asked. Disdain dripped from his words.
Grace’s expression cooled. “You’re tired, Lincoln. Maybe you need to take a break.”
“I would if I were allowed to walk around the ship on my own!”
Several more hybrids looked up, watching the conversation with interest.
Grace stood resolutely in front of him, looking like she was ready to clunk him over the head and haul him off to the detention center.
Irritated, weary, and heart-broken, Lincoln shook his head. He knew he was irrational. The best way to help was to be patient. At least he actually had something to distract him now. He sighed.
Grace put a hand on his arm. “Mina is with Doyle. He will keep her safe.”
Lincoln looked at her hand on his arm. He wanted to believe her. Truly. But Grace was created to deceive, trained to manipulate others into trusting her.
She dropped her hand as if she understood what Lincoln was thinking. “I’m going to lay it out plain and simple. You can stay alone in the hospital wing, lamenting your losses and stewing over how the world has wronged you. Or, you can stay here and help us do something about it, no matter how long it takes.”
“I don’t feel the world has wronged me. You make me sound like a teenage boy.”
Next to him, Alvarez hunkered down over her keyboard, steadily keeping her gaze on her screen.
“Is that what you think?” he asked her.
With great reluctance, Alvarez dragged her gaze over to him. “No,” she said, shooting Grace a look. “But you are angry that you can’t control everything. And I’m worried you are going to snap under the pressure. Mina will make her own choices. So will I. So will Nelson and Carter and all these hybrids. The point is, what are you going to choose to do, Lincoln?”
Lincoln held her gaze. She was right. He had been angst-ridden over things that were outside his control. But mostly, he was afraid. Not only for himself but for his friends. And for Mina, whom he’d only just got back. He didn’t think he could lose her again.
He took a shaky breath, trying to calm down. Was he that close to snapping? To having some sort of breakdown?
He thought about the idea he’d had when they had first boarded the Factory—that he would die here. Since then, he had thought about it often. But he wasn’t ready to die. Not just yet.
Maybe that made all the difference.
Without making eye contact with anyone, he went back to his seat and stared at his own screen. One by one, everyone quit looking at him, giving him space.
If he gave up now, after so many had been through so much, he would never forgive himself.
If he quit now, the aliens had already won.
“What does this mean exactly?” Mina asked as they followed the ever-sloping curve of the tunnel.
Doyle watched her. Her pale face had dark circles under her eyes. She needed to eat again. They had to find the Core and get back to the Nomad as quickly as possible. Otherwise he’d need to find a better way for them to lift their visors without being poisoned by the atmosphere.
“Doyle?” she asked.
“It means we have two samples.”
“But what about the tests you’ve already started?”
“They’re still good. I’d like to compare and see if there are any differences between samples.”
“But you still want to create more hybrids.”
“After seeing that lab back there, you still wonder?”
“No. You’re right. If that were the only argument for the hybrids, it would be enough. Why do you think they chose Earth?”
“I still don’t know, but the Glyph on the Factory breathes oxygen. There has to be a reason.”
“The Glyph was getting bigger. Does that have something to do with it?”
“Maybe.”
For the first time, they came to a T-junction in the tunnel. The adarria didn’t show them which way to go.
Doyle paused, listening. He hadn’t he
ard anything since the Glyph had attacked the glass at the lab behind them.
“Should we toss a coin?” Mina asked.
“We can’t afford to make a wrong turn.”
“The adarria aren’t showing us anything, right? So, maybe there isn’t a wrong turn.”
Doyle looked at Mina and gave her a wry smile. “You know, for a human, you’re pretty smart.”
“I am, aren’t I?”
He stepped back and gestured for her to choose. She turned left and followed the tunnel, which immediately became smaller. It narrowed until he had to duck his head to get through. They walked single file with Doyle leading the way.
After a few more minutes, a blast of frigid air blew past them, rippling their suits and causing their visors to fog up. Doyle wiped his, but all he did was smear the moisture along the glass. They stumbled through for another mile or so, until the tunnel evened out and widened.
“We’ve got to be near the Core now, right?” Mina asked.
Doyle frowned. The Core on the Factory had been hot, filled with liquid light. The tunnel they were following was growing colder by the minute. Even with their suits, they were going to risk hypothermia if they continued in this direction. At least, Mina was. Doyle would last a lot longer. He sighed in frustration.
Soon, Mina was shivering. She put a hand on Doyle’s shoulder to stop him, and when she pressed the button on her comm, her teeth chattered as she spoke.
“Don’t think I’m going to last must longer.”
“Is it just the cold, or something else?”
“The c-cold, I think.”
Doyle stared at the wall next to them. The tunnel was undoubtedly changing, but he didn’t know what that meant. The sense of doom he had been keeping at bay reared its ugly head again. They weren’t going to make it out.
Beside him, Mina was shaking so violently she couldn’t walk straight.
Just as he made a decision to turn back, the adarria in front of him glowed.
“Hey,” he said.
Mina turned to look.
Doyle touched the wall, and it pulled him through. This time he grabbed Mina as he went.
The wall was cold this time. So cold Doyle felt as if he’d plunged into an icy lake. When they fell out onto floor five feet down, they untangled themselves from each other and stood. Mina looked dazed, but Doyle needed to make sure they were alone before checking on her.
They stood in another corridor. This one was obviously well-traveled, with its floors worn smooth and its tall ceiling. But it was empty. Like the rest of the ship, it was completely dark. Doyle reached over to turn off Mina’s headlamp. All his senses were on high alert. He didn’t know where they were or where to go.
The corridor was still bitingly cold. Doyle paused long enough to pull a blanket out of Mina’s pack and threw it around her. She wrapped herself in it and tied it up away from her legs.
“Where are we?” she whispered.
“I don’t know. Keep moving.”
Doyle led her down the corridor, looking back repeatedly to see if they were being followed. He had the strangest sensation they weren’t alone. Finally, unable to stand the tension any longer, he pulled her into an alcove.
“Stay here a minute.”
“What?”
“I won’t be gone long. Promise.”
And with that, he darted back out and into the alcove across the corridor. Then he turned to walk back in the direction they had come, this time at a much faster pace. But when he retraced their steps all the way back to the ventilation shaft, he hadn’t detected anyone or anything. He was paranoid.
Better that than dead.
When he reached Mina, she was huddled in the corner of the alcove, shivering again despite the blanket.
“Come on,” he said. “We better keep moving.”
With each step, the cold became worse. What was causing it?
At the end of the corridor, they found out. A fifty-foot archway led into a vast room. More aether than Doyle had ever seen swirled and floated in a column going all the way up through the middle of the ship. It fed into adarria on the walls.
“Is th-this the Core?” Mina asked. She looked blankly around, and Doyle remembered she couldn’t see. But she didn’t have to see to feel the vast expanse of the room.
“I think so. It looks like the exact opposite of the Factory Core, though. That one has light.”
“Is this what you wanted to see?”
“I don’t know what I wanted to see.”
There was nothing to see. Doyle didn’t dare get too close to the aether. Something told him he wouldn’t be able to control this much of it at once. Why had the adarria brought him here, then? Frustrated, Doyle paced around the outside of the room, looking for anything, any clue, that might be useful. Had he endangered Mina for nothing?
But then Doyle realized… He was in a perfect position to set the aether free here on Condar, just as he’d done on the Factory. What would happen if he did? He grabbed Mina’s hand to walk around the outer edge of the room again, avoiding the swirling column of aether at all costs. If he got caught in that, he wouldn’t be powerful enough to get away. It would eat him alive.
But unlike the Factory floor, the floor here didn’t have adarria. No symbols to speak to. If the aether could be freed, it must not have been from here.
Aware that their time was running out, Doyle hurried Mina out the door. The corridor was still empty, but the sense of being watched followed Doyle all the way back to the ventilation shaft. He had just grabbed her waist to lift her up into the opening when he spotted movement out of the corner of his eye.
He paused long enough to look.
Calla was walking down the corridor with someone else he didn’t recognize. Another hybrid. Calla started running—she’d spotted him.
Without losing another second, Doyle hoisted Mina up into the ventilation shaft, then followed. When he landed inside, he unsheathed his knife and crouched at the entrance, waiting.
“What’s the matter?” Mina asked.
“Calla. She’s here,” he whispered. “Get behind me.”
Mina didn’t wait to be told again. She backed down the tunnel.
“Turn on your lamp as high as it will go and shine it at the entrance. If they pass through, we’ll take them by surprise.”
“They?”
“Someone was with her.”
Doyle waited, his body coiled, ready for a fight. But Calla didn’t follow. Then the light in the grooves faded, which only meant that the adarria had sealed off the entrance.
“Why is she here?” he asked aloud. Only one answer made sense—the Condarri had allowed her to live to find him. But really, that answer wasn’t good, either. The Condarri didn’t show mercy. And he already knew Calla had been running around down on Earth.
Mina must have had the same thought. “How d-did she get here?”
“I don’t know, but I’m sure she saw us, so we better get going. She won’t wait to sound the alarm.”
They ran back to the warmer tunnels, Mina stumbling as her cold feet refused to work properly.
When they finally reached a place where the temperature became warm enough to heat their suits, they collapsed on the floor. Doyle was tired, more tired than he’d felt in a long time. But he had to get back to the Nomad.
“What did you learn?” Mina asked.
“Nothing. But it doesn’t mean I won’t figure it out.”
He leaned his head back on the warm wall behind him, and for the first time since he was a small offspring, Doyle fell asleep without meaning to.
Hours later, he jerked awake. Mina slept with her head on his shoulder. At some point, he’d put an arm around her. Doyle swore, and she woke. He told her to drink some water and then rolled his eyes when she grumbled at him to stop giving her orders.
“This is going to be difficult. If we don’t push through, Mina, Calla could find the Nomad before we get back to it.”
“How much farth
er?”
“Two more days to get back to the Nomad. We can only hope the Condarri haven’t found it yet.”
Mina tightened her pack and nodded. “Ready.”
They took off at a run. Without food, Mina lagged much farther behind than she had at first. But Doyle kept going, knowing he was pushing her too hard but refusing to stop. She didn’t complain, keeping him in sight at all times, just like she had in the mountains.
When they slowed to a walk, Mina was panting hard. The air had turned hot again. They passed the lab. Doyle wished he had more time to explore it, but if he got stranded on Condar, he might as well put a bullet in both their heads. He would if it came to it, he thought grimly. Better that than any torture the Condarri would devise for them.
The thought sobered him, spurring him to grab Mina and carry her on his back.
“Doyle,” she said wearily.
“You okay?”
“I’m sorry I’m holding you back.” Her voice sounded weak.
Doyle didn’t like it at all. “Bit late for that apology,” he joked. “But you saved my alien hide, remember? We’re even. Hey”—he smacked her calf—“stay awake.”
“Why?”
“I need you alert in case we run into trouble.”
Mina sighed.
“Ask me a question. Any question.”
“And you’ll answer it?”
“Yes.”
Mina was silent a moment. Doyle thought she’d gone to sleep, after all.
Then, she asked, “Why were you on that plane? Weren’t the Glyphs about to attack?”
“They were. They were waiting for my signal, actually.”
Mina made a choking noise.
“You shouldn’t be surprised. I’m the commander, remember?”
“But—”
“If it hadn’t been me, someone else would have done it. Calla, actually. She wanted to. She resented me for getting the title.”
“Is there anything about you that Calla doesn’t resent?”
“Good point. It wasn’t always that way. We were… friends.”
“More than friends.”
“Yes.”
Doyle hadn’t meant to go into that. He still didn’t want to. Calla had never been to him then what Mina was to him now.
