My tablet pings, and Kai tilts it toward me so I can read the message.
“I know you’re talking to him. I’ll figure out where he is.”
Cam frowns at me through the vid.
I look him straight in the eyes. I promised him since he was little that I’d never lie to him or hold anything back like adults did to us. Even though it’s been hard at times, I’ve had to tell him truths that were well beyond his age.
“He’s trying to trace our call, so I’m going to go now. SIA will block your tablet from him as soon as we’re done here. I love you.”
Frowning, he straightens up. “I love you guys, too.”
I click end.
Kai looks at me grinning.
“What are you grinning about? This is a serious situation.”
“He said he loved us.”
Once that sinks in, I grin too.
16
Drone Spaceship
We hurry to the cafeteria and find Rand and Philip almost done with dinner. Although I’m relieved Cam is all right, I now feel the weight of the decision I need to make about our father.
After loading up our trays we walk by Josh to sit down. A quick glance confirms he’s scowling at us, but that seems to be the norm these days.
Rand looks up. “How’s Cam?”
I plop down next to him. “He’s a bit freaked out, but he’ll be fine. Honestly, I think I’m more freaked out than he is. After all the academy and the SIA’s protections, I can’t believe our father still got a message to Cam’s tablet.” I shake my head.
“What will your brother do about that?” Philip asks as he pushes his plate away. His eyes nervously dart past me toward Josh.
“We had them turn the tablet off. They can get another one for Cam to use in school. The worst part was telling him that Anonymous is our father.” I sigh. “Now I need to figure out what to do about him.”
“How did he take that?” Rand asks.
I’ve just taken a large bite of stew, so Kai answers for me. “I’m not sure we convinced him that his father doesn’t just want to meet him and Anja.” He frowns.
“But the messages were threatening, right? As Anonymous?” Rand asks.
I swallow. “Yes, but he was really young when our father left. I think he’s always hoped we’d find him and be a whole family again.”
“I can understand that,” Philip says. He’s staring at the table.
“You didn’t grow up with both parents?” I ask.
“No. My mom remarried when I was young. My stepfather is nice enough, but I always thought my dad would come back.” He looks up. “You imagine all sorts of things when you don’t know where they are or why they left.”
I bite the inside of my lip. I knew Cam missed our father, but I thought since he was so smart and resilient that he wouldn’t actually harbor fantasies that he’d come back into our lives. “Thanks, Philip. That helps.”
Philip gives me a weak smile.
Kai and I finish our food and the four of us go to take care of our trays. Josh and his group are still lounging at their table, so we hurry out. We stop in front of the bay of lifts.
I turn to Rand and Kai. “Do you guys have to work on your project tonight?”
Rand lets out a loud breath. “I’m not sure why the commander put me in Josh’s group.”
I slug his arm. “Maybe he wants to test your patience.” I grin.
Rand gives me a hard look. “You’d better be nice.”
“Or else what?” I bat my eyelashes.
“Or else I won’t protect you against him.” He narrows his eyes at me, but his shoulders are still relaxed.
“Protect me?” I grin.
Kai laughs and presses a button to retrieve the lift. “She already kicked his butt twice.”
We all get on the lift laughing. I’m settling back against the lift wall when a hand reaches in and stops the doors from closing. They open back up to reveal Josh and Alex.
I frown as they step onto the lift with us. The door closes, and the tension in the small space can be cut with a knife.
“I see you adopted a pet there, James.” He glances at Philip then looks Rand straight in the eye.
Rand’s jaw ripples as he clenches his teeth. He takes a step toward Josh, while Philip tries to make himself invisible in the corner.
I tense, automatically taking a ready stance.
It seems to take the lift forever to make it up the fourteen levels to the skybridge level. We all need to get off here to cross over to the other building, but when the lift opens, no one moves. I look at Alex. His red hair is a mess as he nervously runs his hand through it. He catches my eye and his gaze gives me a glimpse of regret.
I take confidence in the fact that he most likely doesn’t want to fight and I push past Josh. I grab Philip, and we step outside the lift. He’s shaking. A glance over my shoulder shows Kai hesitate before following me. Alex steps out next, leaving Rand and Josh in the lift.
The door tries to close but I put my hand out and hold it open. “Do you two need to get a room?”
Rand’s lip twitches. I know that he struggles with the darkness deep within himself, but since I’ve gotten to know him, I’ve learned that humor is the best way to diffuse his anger.
I’m hoping it will work with Josh as well.
Neither one moves. I roll my eyes. “Good grief, you two. We need to get to work on our projects. If you can’t even figure out who will get out of the lift first, how are you ever going to work together to make a working drone spaceship?”
Rand raises an eyebrow. He shrugs, but his hands are still clenched. “True. Let’s go get our team organized.”
With that, Rand walks out of the lift and keeps going down the corridor. Josh looks surprised at first, but it’s obvious when it dawns on him that Rand just pulled one over on him. His expression darkens and he hurries out.
The rest of us follow. As we turn the corner onto the skybridge between the two buildings I hear more students unload out of the lifts behind us. Ahead of us a few students are opening the doors to the twin building.
I laugh out loud when Rand and Josh fight over who goes in the door first. “Will they ever get over themselves?” I ask Alex, who’s quietly walking beside us.
“Doubt it. Glad I’m not in their group.”
I nod, agreeing. “They’re going to ruin their chances here if they can’t stop all this nonsense.”
He smooths his hair down as we enter the building. “I know. Josh won’t listen to any of us though.”
“Us?”
“Our group. We’ve all tried to get him to simmer down. He really has something against your friend though.”
I place a hand on Alex’s arm to stop him. We’re off to the side, so students continue to stream past us. “Do you think it’s more than just the leadership position?”
“I don’t know. He’s pretty upset he didn’t get it. He was our class leader every year at the prep school.”
“Really? Your school didn’t think it would be advantageous if others in the school learned from the leadership position?”
His shoulders sag. “No one ran against him,” he says quietly.
“Why not?” asks Kai.
Alex slowly looks at Kai. “Josh wouldn’t let us.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “So, he’s always been like this?”
“Pretty much,” Alex agrees.
“Katrina made it sound like Josh has gotten worse since being here.” I cross my arms.
“That is true. It’s been much worse lately. He’s got more at stake here.”
I throw my hands up. “We all do. Being here is an honor and we’re all lucky to have made it. This academy will define our futures.”
Kai grabs my hand. I realize I’m practically yelling. “Sorry. It’s just–”
The lights dim twice to warn us to get to our classrooms. We hurry after the other students and split off into our groups.
Philip and I hurry into our c
lassroom. Katrina and the others are already there and seated around a table in the middle of the room. We find seats and join them.
Katrina must’ve known Josh followed us up the lift, because she’s studying Philip and I carefully.
“We’re fine,” I lean over and whisper to her.
The others are looking at us, so I say out loud, “Let’s decide what we’ll need for this drone.”
It doesn’t take long to get everyone talking. Carstair already has drawn up several hull designs, so we start there.
“I like this one.” I point to a unique hull design. Instead of a normal rocket shape like most of the others, his looks more like an octopus suspended above a bunch of five rockets. “Why is the top separated from the rocket boosters?”
“It’s still attached, there’s just a disposable tube connecting them. By keeping the rocket boosters separate, we can use a second computer brain to re-land them.”
“Like our personnel jump ships? Their booster systems come back down to the launch pad after the jump ship is in orbit. But they don’t have a separation between them. It looks like all one rocket before launch.”
“Right. But this one has solar panels folded down around that tube portion. Once the main portion is in orbit, the octopus-shape opens up to reveal the solar panels for power,” says Carstair.
Tod leans forward. “But we’re really needing to stand out with this project, right?” He’s grinning at us.
“Yes,” I answer slowly, knowing they’re setting me up for something.
“Although functionally it’s a great place to protect the solar panels, the main reason for the separation and the unique top shape is to stand out amongst our peers. We got the idea from an old sci-fi movie I once saw. I doubt anyone will come up with something similar.”
“But it has to function. We have to get it into the atmosphere.”
“It’ll get there. And we’ll even have the re-landing of the boosters programmed by testing day,” offers Carstair.
I look at Philip. “What do you think?”
The others turn to look at him, and he blushes pink. He studies the table. “I think as long as the ship is aerodynamic enough to push through the atmosphere, I know we can come up with the dual computers and navigation.”
I grin. “Katrina?”
She smiles back. “I think it’s genius. I haven’t seen a project quite like it.” She looks around the room at some of the older examples. “And I have just the interface in mind for that kind of design.”
“Great. Now we need to figure out what supplies we need. Carstair, you want to place the order through your tablet?”
“Sure,” he says.
“How long will it take to get the parts we need?” asks Tod.
I look to Philip. I know he reads everything, and I haven’t read through our project assignment specs too closely.
He taps a few commands into his tablet. “Unless we need something not able to be fabricated by the academy shop, we should have everything tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow is Friday and we all have sim testing. So how about we meet here on Saturday morning to get organized and start putting it together?” I suggest.
“I don’t think they’ll be able to have this many solar panels ready by then,” says Katrina. She’s frowning down at her tablet.
My backpack vibrates. I mentally brace myself as I take my own tablet out of my pack. There’s a new message from Anonymous.
This is why I didn’t want to look. I swallow the bile coming up my throat and force myself to swipe the message away without opening it. Dear old father can wait. I open Carstair’s message instead and pull up the design he’s created.
“You’re probably right. There are a lot of panels, even for our small ship. But we can still work on the rest of the hull, right?” I look at Carstair.
“Yep. We can add the panels later. We do have,” he looks down at his tablet, “four weeks to finish this project.”
Katrina looks at me with wide eyes. “We’ve already been here four weeks?”
“I was thinking the same thing.” I grin at her.
“That means we need to be halfway done with the sims by tomorrow,” Philip says quietly.
My expression falls as he seems to shrink within himself. I take a last look at our design. “Good point, Philip. We’ve got a great design here. Why don’t we figure out what exactly we need to do on Saturday, then we can all go up to the sim room to put in some extra time.” I look around the circle at my teammates. “Does that work?”
They all nod, and we put our heads together to figure out what kind of rocket booster, electrical, computer, and navigation parts we need to order and how they’ll all fit together. Philip and Katrina pretty much already know what kind of parts they want out of the computer systems, and Tod adds his ideas for the navigation system. Since our rockets only need to penetrate the lowest atmospheric orbit, we won’t need satellite navigation, so that helps to get our parts sooner.
Carstair hits send on the rest of the parts and we grab our packs to head out of the room. I ping Rand and Kai to meet us in the sim level. Philip and I come around the corner and find Kai already waiting for us.
I grin and he pulls me into a hug.
“Good planning session?” he asks.
I wink. “The best.”
He laughs and leads us toward the skybridge. As we’re crossing, Rand calls for us. We turn and wait for him to catch up.
He doesn’t look happy. But at least there’s no blood.
“How’d project time go?” I ask sweetly.
He glares at me. We start walking again and I tell him our plan to go back up to the sims. He just nods, lost in his thoughts.
As we step onto the lift I look back down the corridor. Josh and Alex are just crossing the skybridge. Through the glass, I can see Katrina walking ahead of them.
I stop the lift door from closing. “Just one second,” I tell the others as Katrina hurries toward me, tears in her eyes. She stumbles into the lift and I mash the button for the sim level.
“What’s wrong?” I ask Katrina. She’s facing me, her face blotchy.
All the guys back up against the wall not knowing what to do with a crying girl.
She hides her face in her hands. “He told me I couldn’t help our project team.”
The lift opens, and I pull her to the side. I motion for the guys to go ahead without me. Once they’re out of earshot, Katrina’s face crumbles again. I pull her into a hug and hold her until she stops sobbing.
17
Safety in Numbers
Katrina looks down and dries her face with her uniform sleeve.
“What do you mean he said you couldn’t help us?”
“He knows how smart I am with robotics. He can’t win against me.” She looks up. “I’m not saying that to brag.”
I study her face. “I know. I understand what you’re saying, but he can’t stop you. It’s a school project, and you need the grade. It’s fifty percent of our points. And besides, we need you.”
“You don’t know him like I do.” She hiccups.
“I understand he got away with that at prep school. But we’re at the most elite space academy in our country. He can’t behave like that here and get away with it.” My pulse quickens and I clench my hands as I think about how much negative influence Josh has had on so many of us.
Katrina flinches as the lift opens. A stream of students get out, but none of them are Josh.
I sigh. “Listen. If the rest of us stay united, help each other, and look out for one another, we can strip him of his power. The only way he can hurt us is if we let him.”
She looks doubtful.
I lead her away from the lifts and toward where Rand stands between two sims. He glances up as we get closer. Both sims are running.
“Kai and Philip?”
He scowls. “Did you know Philip was so this far behind in the sims because of Josh?”
I nod.
“If you
two want to stand guard, I’ll go finish that one.” He points across the room to one of the larger machines. I squint as I try to figure out which one it is.
“It’s the Tel-AV critical failure mission,” he says, almost smiling now. “I think Josh and I need the same one next, so I should get it done before he gets up here.”
“Good idea. We’re fine, go ahead.”
He takes one last glance around the area and then jogs over to the machine and gets in.
“See what I mean. Even he’s altering his schedule around Josh,” says Katrina. She’s blinking back tears as she watches Rand. “I thought I could handle being around Josh. I’ve tried being a good example to him.”
“Alex says he’s not listening to anyone in your group,” I say quietly.
She looks at me sharply. “When did he tell you that?”
“On the way upstairs. Josh and Rand were racing ahead, and Alex seemed tired of Josh’s antics.”
Katrina freezes.
I glance over my shoulder in time to see Josh stomp off the lift. By himself. “Well, that can’t be good.” I turn back to Katrina. “It seems he’s always with someone.”
She just nods.
I clench my teeth. I grab Katrina’s arm and lead her over to the next sim. I push her into the machine. “Strap in.” I close the door and quickly walk far enough away that I’m not near any of the sims my friends are in, but close enough I can keep them in sight.
Out of the corner of my eye I see Josh hurrying up the path that’ll pass right by me. I quickly take my tablet out and unlock it.
Crap.
As if dealing with Josh isn’t enough, I had forgotten I had a message from my father. Now I have two messages. Both unread.
I hover my finger over the message as I wait to find out what Josh will do. My heart races as one of the sims nearby finishes and the door starts cycling open. I raise my eyes just enough to watch Josh pass right by the sim.
Kai’s head pops up over the sim to my left. He turns to face me, watching just as Josh stops right in front of me. I almost drop my tablet with my hands sweating so much.
“Josh.” A small corner of myself celebrates as I sound confident, not scared. My knees shake, mocking me.
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