Awakened

by Ell Leigh Clarke

  “Joel, that’s…that’s ridiculous.” She was scrambling for some logic to fight back with, but coming up with nothing.

  He cocked his head and looked her in her eyes. “Is it? I’m not so sure, at this point.”

  He dropped the t-shirt down on the bed and left the room, carefully sidestepping her when passing through the doorway. Had it been anyone else, anyone with more understanding about what they’d done, he’d be more furious than he was.

  But having seen what he’d just read in her micro-expressions, he understood it wasn’t entirely her fault. She just didn’t compute things like most people did.

  The only consolation in all of this was because he was paying attention, he may have given her the logical foundation to start the formation of her own internal moral code.

  Shit, this is like programming a human, he thought to himself, thinking back to all the ways that he’d learned to influence his teams in the past.

  Of all the work he’d done with those squaddies, this was by far the most clinical and logical discussion he’d ever had. And man, he knew something about squaddies who could get tangled up in their own thoughts.

  He shook his head, calming down quicker than he expected. Still, he needed some space.

  Molly, stunned and emotionally bombarded, just turned and sat on his bed next to where his shirt had landed. Half in a daze, crying inside, she stared blankly into a space, one hand subconsciously stroking his shirt.

  A moment later, she heard the front door open and close. Then silence.

  A tiny tear tracked down her face.

  A few blocks from safe house, fifty kilometers west of Uptarlung

  “Let’s try the next place.” Erik walked determinedly back down the garden path from the last house, having just had the door slammed in their faces.

  “This is exhausting. We’re never going to find them at this rate,” complained Henry, dragging his feet like a child who didn’t want to go to school.

  “Pizza parlor.” Erik pointed up at the sign of the next building along. “They may have ordered pizza at some point…” he said, already stepping through the door.

  “Not open yet, buddy!” came a call from the kitchen behind the counter.

  Erik looked around, then looked at his holo to check the time.

  “So, what? People don’t want pizza at four in the afternoon?”

  “Not around here, they don’t,” came the disembodied voice.

  A burly Ogg padded around from the kitchen and clambered onto a stool to peer over the counter at him. “We don’t have the ovens fired up yet. Can’t help you.”

  At that moment Henry dragged his ass through the door and wandered, disinterested, over to the counter. He slumped his arms on the faux-marble surface, and leaned his chin elegantly on his arms. He fluttered his eyelashes and held the Ogg’s gaze.

  “We’re looking for information,” continued Erik, ignoring Henry.

  The Ogg, a little unnerved now, peeled his eyes away from Henry to look at Erik.

  “What kind of information?” he asked.

  “A girl. Well maybe a guy. But maybe both. You see, we know the girl came here this afternoon, and we think she’s here to meet with a guy…”

  The Ogg glanced sideways again at Henry, who had cocked one hip, and was now resting his chin on his hand, elbow on the counter.

  “And who is this girl to you?” asked the Ogg, suspicious about what he might be getting pulled into. These guys didn’t look official. In fact, they looked more like trouble.

  “His cousin,” piped up Henry, casually, still gazing at the Ogg.

  The Ogg had no choice except to look back at him. Anyone watching would have seen him almost hypnotized by the bizarre pair at the counter. They would also have seen him subconsciously lean back a couple of inches.

  Heck, if he’d not been standing on a stool he may well have moved back a few feet…and then perhaps even stepped out of the back door until the two Oggs had left.

  But instead, he remained there, transfixed.

  “His cousin. Mmm hmm. And why are you looking for his cousin here?”

  Erik started to talk, but stumbled. Henry took over.

  “Well, you see, she’s gotten all tied up with this guy, and his mama, my auntie, said, ‘Henrik…’ that’s what they call us both…Henrik, cuz my name is Henry and his is Erik. His mama said, ‘Henrik, if you know what’s good for you, you’ll follow your cousin and bring her back to her mama. That boy’—the one she ran off with—‘is a devil in a Sunday hat. You bring her back here to us, you hear?’”

  The Ogg glazed over, trying to take it all in.

  Henry continued in his strange dialect, rambling in conversational style. “So that’s what we did. We followed her when she skipped out of work early, and she led us right here. We’re going to find her and take her back to his mama.”

  “Cuz we know what’s good for us,” finished Erik, a little more rigidly.

  “Well, erm. I’ve not seen anyone new this afternoon, but there is a girl and a guy who have started coming in here recently.”

  “Oooh…do tell!” Henry’s eyes brightened with interest, and he started tracing patterns with his finger on the counter.

  “There’s not much more to tell. They never get it delivered; always come and get it. No matter what time of night it is. My guess is that they don’t live that far from here. Maybe five minutes by car. I’ve often wondered if they’re staying in Old Lady Evette’s place—the one with the ghost of a sphinx knocking around. She sometimes rents it out to groups and couples wanting to lay low, if you know what I mean.” He raised his eyebrows a little and nodded his head knowingly, as if Henrik would understand what he meant.

  The two Oggs in atmosuits looked at each other blankly, then looked back at the pizza shop owner.

  “Let me draw you a map,” the guy behind the counter suggested, trying to alleviate the social awkwardness that was expanding with every minute these two stooges were in his shop.

  “Excellent, thank you,” responded Henry, a gooey look on his face.

  The Ogg scribbled some shapes on a napkin, and handed it over. “But they ain’t who you’re looking for. They’ve been here for weeks now.”

  “Yeah, but they might know my friend,” said Erik, a little more enthusiastically than he had intended.

  “Thought you said she was your cousin?”

  “Yeah. My cousin. That’s right. Thank you. You’ve been very helpful.”

  And with that Erik turned sharply and headed directly out of the shop door again, hips swinging with optimism…just a little. The Ogg watched him go, then noticed that Henry was wiggling his fingers in a wave as he practically waltzed out behind him.

  Spontaneously, as if mesmerized by the interaction, the Ogg held up his hand in a wave and wiggled his fingers back. Catching himself, he looked at his hand, glanced around, wondering if anyone had seen him in his empty pizza parlor, and then snatched his hand down out of the air, suddenly very self-conscious.

  They headed straight back to their car. Erik got in the driver’s side and began deciphering the map, hurriedly unfolding the sheets to see the full picture.

  Henry started making a call on his holo.

  “What are you doing?” asked Erik, suddenly pissed at something, his excitement gone.

  “Calling the boss to tell him we have a lead.” Henry looked innocently and obliviously at Erik. “Why, d’you want to call it in?”

  “No, you go ahead. You always steal my thunder.” Erik’s jaw was set as he looked back at the road.

  “What you mean? We were both canvassing the area.” Henry argued.

  “It was my idea to try the pizza place.” Erik avoided eye contact.

  “It was the next building on the road!” Henry’s voice was high pitched as if he were being attacked.

  And with that they were squabbling again.

  An hour later Dewitt received a call that Henrik had found another lead they were about to check ou
t.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Safe house, fifty kilometers west of Uptarlung

  Molly found herself sitting in the kitchen, opening her fourth beer that evening. Joel had stormed out into the night, and since they were jamming their signals, there was no easy way to trace him.

  He’ll be back once he calms down, she told herself, hoping she was right.

  Oz had been exceptionally quiet. Whether it was the effect of knowing she’d altered his base code and then lied to him about his reboot, or whether it was because her system had overwhelmed him, she couldn’t tell.

  All she knew was if she kept drinking, she could keep feeling numb. And right now?

  Fuck it, numb was good.

  Paige came into the kitchen carrying an empty mug. She plopped it into the sink of water to soak and turned to lean against the counter.

  Molly looked up at her. “I guess you heard Joel and I had a fight.” She glanced out of the kitchen window, as if she could figure out where Joel had gone by looking at the fading light outside.

  “No, didn’t hear a thing through these paper-thin walls.” Paige answered flatly, before allowing a smirk to break.

  Molly was confused for a second before she recognized the sarcasm. She always had difficulty figuring out when someone was being ironic or not, and had always put it down to her lack of social conditioning growing up.

  Getting the joke, she too cracked a smile.

  Paige looked at her sympathetically, knowing only too well the feeling after an argument like the one she had overheard. “You okay?” she asked.

  Molly nodded. She took another swig of beer, and then thought to offer Paige one. She signaled at the bottle she was holding.

  Paige nodded. “Yeah, what the hell.”

  Molly pointed at the fridge by way of invitation and watched as Paige retrieved one.

  “Where’s Garet?” Molly asked her.

  Paige sat down at the table to join her. “In Joel’s room, working through the data on the pod. He thinks there will be something there. He just needs to find it, and make sense of some of the account documents. It’s all a bit over my head, to be honest.”

  “You and me both,” Molly admitted grimly, as she took another swig of beer before setting the bottle down and holding her face in her hands.

  “Oh, Paige, I’ve fucked up. I’ve fucked up for all of us, and now you’re in danger, and we all have to leave the system. And soon.” She hesitated, as if not even wanting to admit it by speaking it out loud. “And Joel, who is meant to be helping with all this, doesn’t even want to look at me.”

  Paige frowned at her. “Hey, hush now. That’s not true. He’s just blowing off steam. Sounds like you two have been under a lot of pressure.”

  Neechie wandered in and settled on the table right next to Molly’s left arm. He looked at her, almost as if he were concerned.

  “I know, Neech. It’s hard seeing your mama drinking. But if you knew half of what was going down, you wouldn’t be quite so judgmental.” She tickled him behind his head, gently digging her fingers into his smooth purple skin. He closed his eyes and wriggled up against her some more, snuggling and enjoying the petting.

  “Weird name for a sphinx,” Paige commented.

  “Yeah, short for Nietzsche; a human philosopher from ancient times,” explained Molly. “Except Joel didn’t want it spelled the proper way, cuz it was too complicated… as if using bloody Estarian wasn’t complicated. So we changed it to ‘Neechie’.” Molly rolled her eyes, embarrassed that she’d agreed to it.

  “Ha! That’s even more bizarre! Giving an Estarian cultural icon such a human name!” Paige giggled away to herself.

  “Yeah. I guess,” Molly agreed, suddenly seeing it from an Estarian perspective for the first time. “So, you’re half human, half Estarian, then? That’s pretty rare.”

  “That’s right. Only one that I know of personally. I’ve heard of other cases through rumors and articles, though.” Paige studied the label on her bottle of beer, almost avoiding the attention on her personage. “Mostly in medical journals, to be honest.”

  “It’s a beautiful mix,” Molly tried to acknowledge, somewhat awkwardly. Feeling a little unsettled at this girl talk thing, she fell back into what she knew.

  “I remember when I was dabbling with some Estarian biochem, I read something about how humans and Estarians have a very similar number of chromosome pairs. I think humans have twenty-three, and Estarians twenty-four. Anyway, under the right conditions, the human pairs can acquire enough of the missing bases during the fertilization process of two gametes. I mean, the chance of it happening is something like one in a billion, because there’s so much that needs to happen before mitosis of that first cell kicks in to form a viable zygote, but…”

  Molly stopped, realized that she’d lost Paige in her rush to cover her awkward feelings.

  “Yeah, I must have missed that article!” Paige chuckled.

  “Sorry. I er…geek. You know.”

  “Yeah, I know. It’s fine.” Paige looked down at the table again. “Actually, it’s interesting. Mostly people don’t even realize I’m half human, and they go all weird when they meet my human father. Like I’m adopted or something.”

  “They don’t notice that you’re kind of human-sized?”

  “I guess they just assume that I’m short. Or young… Or they’re too busy thinking about other things.” She indicated down at her chest and the human-looking cleavage. “Most Estarians have flatter breasts, so when they notice I don’t, that tends to be all they notice. Particularly the guys.”

  “Yup. I get that.” Molly drew in her breath, nodding in sympathy.

  Having spent the last few years in the military, she knew what it was to be objectified for her body shape above her abilities. Many times, she’d caught her male teammates checking her out in the mixed showers.

  “So, your mom is Estarian?” She steered the subject away from the usual discussions about how they were often treated in their culture. She didn’t need another reason to be depressed.

  Paige leaned back in her chair. “Yeah. 100%. And not just physically; she’s very much ‘of the traditions’. You know, the old religion of the Estarians? I think that’s what fascinated my father the most when they met. In the old days, she would have been a high priestess or something, but since a lot of that fell away during the commercial era, people started a new religion.”

  “What? You mean shopping and spending money as a way to inner peace?” Molly asked flippantly.

  A small smirk slipped from Paige. “Yeah, actually. It’s a simpler fix than years and years of meditation to master the veil between the realms. People like my mom are kind of seen as outcasts or weirdos that people only go to when they’re in trouble and need to call on their ancestors.”

  Molly shrugged as Neechie purred. “I think that’s the way it goes across all civilizations.”

  Molly thought back to her years of extensive reading about different times in different star systems. Once you’ve seen a few, it becomes very clear that the same patterns tend to emerge again and again.