by Jaleta Clegg
“The language teacher,” Aramis said.
“It was just a shallow cave. They expected something to happen but nothing did.”
“You didn’t see darkness?” Aramis asked me. “Like a hypnoteacher that was badly adjusted?”
I shook my head. “I don’t get along with hypnoteaching.”
“Then where did you learn their language?” Commander Hovart asked.
“They dragged me across here,” I said, tracing a faint path. “I think that’s where they took me. There was a huge wall of thorns and a cave off to one side. There was some other kind of hypnoteacher there, a big column thing.”
“It makes sense,” Fya said. “We believe that canyon is where they keep their women and children. They’d keep their tech there, too.”
“The logical place for the generators is right here,” I said and touched a spot on the opposite side of the side canyon. “If I read the scans right, that is.”
“Lovar puts the generators back here, under the cliff somewhere,” Commander Hovart said, his finger next to mine on the map. “Now we have to find a way to reach them.” He tugged at his collar, a reminder that we weren’t free to wander where we willed.
“Lovar thinks the collars work on some frequency akin to our stunners or a nerve pulse,” Fya said. “With a com unit we could blanket the area and block the wands.”
“I have three in the stuff I cached,” I said.
The three men exchanged grins.
“Then we hunt tonight?” Aramis asked Commander Hovart.
Commander Hovart studied me, tugging his lip as he thought. He shook his head after a long pause. “Not tonight. Tomorrow, before the rains begin.”
“Rains?” I asked.
“Every few days, it rains buckets all day,” Darus said. “We get left in here for the day. Should start about midnight tomorrow, judging by the clouds overhead.”
“You’ll go, Dace,” Commander Hovart said. “You know where the packs are. Aramis and Fya will go with you.”
“And me,” Darus said.
Commander Hovart studied Darus for a long moment. He finally nodded. “You four then. We also need someone to make contact with alpha group. Lovar is making a copy of the scans for them. Their camp should be somewhere here.” He pointed to a spot on the river. “You leave tomorrow, about this time.”
“We just walk out of here?” I asked, confused.
“Slip out, yes,” Commander Hovart said. “We’ve done it before. You have about two hours before they notice. If you get caught. . .” He didn’t finish. He didn’t have to.
“Two hours should be long enough,” Aramis said. “Show us where we’re going.”
We bent over the map. I found our camp and where I thought I’d hidden the packs. Aramis and Fya walked away with the map, whispering together. Plotting the fastest way there and back, I thought with another wide yawn.
“Tomorrow,” Darus said, “work as slowly as you can. And don’t pick up any big rocks.”
“Whatever you say,” I answered as I lay down in the sand and let my eyes close. I ached. I wanted my ship, I wanted to know Clark and Jasyn were safe. I wanted to be free again. I didn’t know if I wanted Darus to know who I was. I wanted to know why he’d abandoned me. I fell asleep wanting. And dreamed of flying free, like a bird.
Chapter 19
They listened to the list of names clicking through the night. Hope, almost untrusted, showed in their faces. Jasyn listened intently. The idea of using pulse code to communicate had exploded in the night after they were released. She didn’t understand it, she’d never learned it, but she listened as Linna and Ruttie translated it for the rest of them.
Name after name was listed. Group after group reported in, including many who hadn’t been shut in the same cave with her. She clenched her hands into fists, waiting to hear Clark’s name. She’d never missed anyone this much, not even her parents. He had to be out there, he had to be in one of the groups.
Roz sat next to her, the same look of hope on her own face. Jasyn reached for the other woman’s hand. Roz looked startled at the touch. Then she squeezed back, a silent message of mutual support. They held hands and waited.
The list grew. The night dragged, hot and muggy and filled with dim purple light and the rapid clicking. Jasyn blinked heavy eyes and tried to stay awake. She had to know Clark was all right. He had to be.
Dace’s name was listed, late into the night. She didn’t know whether to be happy or sad about it. Dace had been captured. Did she have any hope of escaping left?
Roz squeezed her hand. Tears glittered on her cheeks. The list of names ended. Linna listened intently, not speaking. Ruttie said something about plans for escape, items other groups had collected. Clark had not been named. It was like a knife in her heart. Tears of her own burned in her eyes.
“They aren’t here,” Roz whispered. “They’re dead.” She bit back sobs.
“Maybe they just haven’t reported,” Jasyn said. “Maybe they’re too far away.”
“And maybe we’ll just walk out of here and fly away tomorrow,” Roz said.
Jasyn let go of the other woman’s hand. “Give up hope and die, Roz. Just die. I can’t stop hoping he’s out there somewhere.”
“Wasn’t it Dace you were worried about? I heard her name. And your ship.”
“Which means she isn’t free anymore. They caught her, too.” Jasyn wrapped her arms around her knees, trying to find what comfort she could.
“Then who else, Jasyn?”
“I didn’t hear Clark’s name. We were married a month ago. Who are you waiting for, Roz? Who’s name wasn’t called?”
“My brother. He was fourteen. This was his first flight. I talked them into letting him sign on as an apprentice. He wanted it so badly. Wanted to be just like me.”
“Was there someone else, Roz?” Jasyn had to remind herself that others had been here longer, had lost a lot more than she had.
“I was supposed to meet Justen on Parrus, when the flight was over.” Roz stirred sand with one hand. “I was going to resign then. I had an offer to work dirtside refitting ships. And Justen had a management job. We were planning on a summer wedding on Parrus, a honeymoon through the sector and then a real home on Harison.” She wiped her face on her sleeve. “I doubt he’s still waiting for me.”
Jasyn put her arm around Roz. Roz stiffened and then relaxed into the embrace. Her shoulders shook with a sob she tried to muffle in her hands.
“We’re getting out of here,” Jasyn said. Her own chin trembled with tears she refused to cry. “We’re going to get free and go home.”
Roz pushed away. “We’re going to die here, just like the others.” She crawled away into the dark, alone.
Jasyn huddled on the ground. She wanted to wipe out Roz’s last comment, she didn’t want to admit that she was going to grow old and die on this horrible planet. She didn’t want it to be true. She wanted Clark to be waiting for her. She wanted him to put his arms around her and tell her it was all going to work out. She wanted him to argue with her over her dirty socks. She wanted him to look at her with that sparkle in his green eyes that said he was up to mischief. She wanted him to smile at her in the way that made her breathless. She wanted him more than she had ever wanted anything in her life.
She tried to keep the tears back. They fell anyway, thick and warm, itching as they trickled over her cheek. She wiped them away, again and again. She finally fell asleep, crying and listening to the intermittent clicking.
She woke, then wished she hadn’t. She didn’t know if she could face another day. It was tempting to just curl up and sleep. It would be so easy to quit.
Taffer nudged her. He grinned when he saw she was awake.
“What?” She rubbed her swollen eyes.
“We’re going to do it this time,” he said. “We’re going to get free of this place.”
“You’ve lost your last marbles, Taffer. We’re never going to get free of this place.”
Taffer shook his head. “I said we are going to get free. The ships are waiting. There’s a map of the whole canyon, Jasyn. One of the groups has it. And a whole sheet of scan data. We’ve got them this time. We are going to get free.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because it’s your shipmate that did it. Wasn’t her name Dace? She smuggled in pockets full of things that will get us out of here.” He emphasized each of the last words with his fist on the soft sand.
“Dace,” Jasyn said. Then smiled. If anyone could have smuggled in something useful or found a way out of the trap, it would have to be Dace.
“Are you Patrol, too?” Taffer asked.
“What?”
“She’s Patrol, undercover, has to be,” Taffer said. “Hovart said she was. I knew they’d figure us out and send help eventually.”
“Dace hates the Patrol.”
Taffer grinned and patted her knee. “Thought I’d let you know it worked.” He crawled away to talk with Ruttie about the dismantled com unit.
Why would they possibly think Dace was undercover Patrol? Were they all slipping into madness?
She met Roz by the sluggish stream.
Roz splashed water over her face. She wiped her eyes clear and stared at Jasyn. “They’re dead,” she said in a defeated voice. “We are too. We just don’t realize it yet.”
“Roz.” Jasyn reached out a hand to the other woman.
Roz pulled away. “Don’t touch me. Don’t offer me sympathy. Just leave me alone.” She stomped away, to stand hunched and miserable on the far side of the clearing.
Jasyn washed her own face. The water was barely cool. She plunged her hands into the stream and stared at them. Her nails were torn and broken. The polish was chipped and almost gone. She was glad the water would not show her reflection. She didn’t want to know what she looked like. She clenched her hands into fists, hiding her battered nails.
“I am going to get off this world,” she promised herself. “And I’m going to do it very soon.” And Clark was going to be there. He had to be.
The golden men came not long after that, pulling aside the thorns and herding the prisoners out as if nothing at all had happened the day before or during the night. Jasyn walked with the others, silently, to the wide clearing with its cooking pots.
She pounded the sludge in the pot all through the hot morning, pretending each time she slammed the stick into the pot that it hit one of the golden men. We will get free, she said to herself, each word matching a pounding thump. Over and over, until they stopped to dump the morning’s sludge into the machine.
She ate her brick mechanically, chewing and swallowing without tasting it. She drank from the stream and spent the afternoon pounding again. Sweat ran into her eyes, dripping from her chin into the pot. It trickled down her back, leaving salty trails behind. She pounded the sludge and tried to imagine what she would say when she saw Clark again.
The sun sank into a muggy evening. They were herded back to their pen and locked behind the thorns. They waited while the sun set, its orange light fading to dirty reds before the purple glow of the shield drowned out what was left.
“They don’t even let us see the stars,” Roz said, startling her as the other woman sat beside her. Roz glanced at her then away, staring into the night shadows under the thorn bushes. “I’m sorry, Jasyn, for what I said. It’s just been so long.”
“I don’t think I’d last years,” Jasyn admitted. “I’ve only been here a few days and I’m already starting to go crazy.”
“Do you really think we can get out?” Roz asked, her voice small, not daring to hope.
“If anyone can get us out, it will be Dace.”
“I heard what Taffer said, that she’s Patrol. Did you really come for us?”
“She’ll hit you if you ever accuse her of being Patrol. We’re exactly what I said we were, traders hoping to make a good profit. Dace just has a knack for getting into trouble and getting out of it in one piece.”
“Tell me. Give me some hope, Jasyn.”
“Have you ever heard of the Sessimoniss?” Jasyn asked.
Others crept close to hear.
“Seven foot tall lizard people,” Jasyn said. “My brother took something they valued. He got Dace involved. And me. We ended up on their home world.”
She told the story of their adventures with the Sessimoniss. Dace had pulled luck out of a hopeless situation and got them off the Sessimoniss homeworld. She told them about being stranded well outside of normal travel lanes in a broken down antique ship with the life support systems failing and only hours to live. Jasyn embellished the story, made it seem worse. She didn’t have to exaggerate much. She finished to find herself the center of a circle of avid listeners.
“Now tell me the truth,” Roz demanded. “You made it up.”
“It happened, pretty much as I told it,” Jasyn said.
Roz turned away.
“Roz,” Jasyn said, scrambling to her feet. “Believe it or not. I don’t care. But don’t turn your back on me, don’t turn your back on life. We are going to get out. And we need you.”
“For what?” Roz whirled to face her. “For hauling water day after day?”
“For putting our ships back together.”
“For helping Ruttie,” Taffer said from the back of the circle. He eased his way forward to face Roz. “You’re an engineer. He needs help with the com unit.”
“It’s useless, Taffer,” Roz said.
“Only if you believe it is,” Taffer answered.
They were interrupted by a wild series of clicks echoing through the trees. Taffer stopped, head cocked at the sound. He turned to Linna. “What are they saying?”
“They got a wand,” she said breathlessly. “They actually got one! They’re sending it downstream now.”
“A wand?” Taffer repeated.
“Then we can finally get these off?” Roz tugged her wide collar. She grinned savagely. “Maybe we will get out of here after all.”
The night erupted in whoops and shouts of excitement. They were going to get free, Jasyn thought. They were really going to do it. She grinned back at Roz.
“We’re getting out of here,” she said.
“And we’re going to find the others,” Roz promised. “Or die trying.”
Chapter 20
The day dragged by. I dawdled with the rocks as much as I thought I could. I carried small ones to the side, one in each fist, and spent my time fitting them carefully in with the others. The golden men didn’t even seem to notice. I studied them surreptitiously as I worked. They really weren’t very smart. But what about that one I’d met in the cave who had seemed more intelligent than these? Where did he come from? What was in the caves behind their thorn wall? Where did they keep their women and children and the old ones, or were they all young? The whole planet was still a puzzle, one I didn’t want to solve. I just wanted off.
I sweated my way through the day. Commander Hovart and a whole group of others spent several hours pretending to move a giant boulder. They rolled it maybe six feet in the whole time. If they had really been trying, it would have been moved in less than ten minutes, the whole twenty feet to the edge of the road, with less than half the people straining around it. Our guards didn’t seem to care.
Time crawled. I had knots in my stomach. What if they caught us tonight? What would they do to us? I was still sore from my last beating. Was it really worth the risk for a bundle of mostly clean socks and ration bars?
The day began to wane, the sun slipping behind the cliffs. We worked in hot shadow for a while longer as the sunlight edged up the opposite wall. The men gathered us and marched us to our thorny cage.
We spread out and waited in silence. The basket of food was delivered. Darus brought a brick and handed it to me.
“I can’t eat it,” I whispered. “I’m too nervous.”
“You’ll be worse on an empty stomach,” he whispered back.
I made myse
lf eat it. Darus sat next to me, leaning against the rock cliff and munching his own brick. I shot glances at him. Was it time to tell him who I was? Was it time to ask him why he’d left me on Tivor? No, I didn’t think I could face his explanations or excuses, not with the night ahead to be nervous about.
“Do I have crumbs down my front?” he asked, startling me out of my thoughts. “You’ve been staring at me and pretending you aren’t ever since I sat down.”
“Just nervous.” I beat a hasty retreat for the stream. Why was he following me around? He’d attached himself to me as soon as I’d been dumped in their enclosure. Did he suspect? How could he possibly suspect I was his daughter? I thought the word and rolled it around my mind. What was it like to be someone’s daughter? What would it have been like to grow up with a father? I couldn’t even begin to wrap my brain around that fantasy. From what I’d seen of Darus, I could like him. But what of the years of pain between us? Why had he left me there, in that orphanage?
“It’s time for us to go,” Fya said behind me.
I stood up from the water where I’d been squatting, lost in thought, for quite a while to judge by the cramp in my legs. Darus and Aramis waited near the thorn wall. Tylor wiggled the thin part, working it loose. The rest watched us, mixed feelings of worry and hope on their faces.
“Good luck,” Commander Hovart said. “Aramis has the papers for alpha group. When you find them, tell them to send the message. The leaders meet in three days to plan our escape.”
My hands were shaking and damp. I wiped them on my legs. My heart raced. Escape. It was going to happen. I’d only been here a few days, how was it for those who’d been here years?
Tylor pulled a section out of the bottom of the thorn wall. It was barely big enough for us to wiggle through. I watched Fya slide through the gap without effort. Aramis was almost as quick. I lay down and squirmed through the hole. My suit snagged. Fya and Aramis took my arms and pulled me out.
