Our chairs released us, and David rested his forehead on the edge of the console.
I slid my hand along his back. “Hey, we made it.”
“You did good, kid,” Dad said.
David elevated his head. “I think after today I’m going to retire from flying. I don’t have the nerve for this.” A chirp sounded from the console, and a light flittered across the window. “Nematali Carash and the ambassador made it to another ship. They’re sending help.”
I sat back in my chair and covered my face with my hands. A giggle sprang free. Not that any of this had been funny. Spending time with David was never boring, that was for sure.
Dad smiled and messed my hair. I collapsed into his arms. His strength infused me. For so long I’d dreamed of getting away from the Army—of getting away from him. Nothing could have been further from what I wanted now.
“How long was I on that ship?” Dad asked.
“About three days.”
He cringed. “I never went back to Iraq, did I?”
I placed my hands on his cheeks. “You’re going to be okay now.”
He nodded and pulled me into another hug. “I know, Pequeña. I know.”
I felt him lean over my shoulder and shake David’s hand. Did he know it had been David he saved, and not Colin?
Maybe it didn’t matter. As long as he was back with me. For good, this time.
The ship jiggled.
David frowned into the console. “What is that?” The ship lurched again, and he pressed buttons overhead that I couldn’t see. “That’s not possible.”
The happy little bubble in my stomach popped. “What’s not possible?”
“Our directionals shot off—like they were preprogrammed or something.”
“Is that bad?”
He fiddled with the controls. “Maybe. It’s asking for a passcode.”
Dad stepped beside him. “I guess you don’t know what that passcode is.”
“No.”
Earth came into view. Big and beautiful. And getting closer.
Dad stood taller and pointed out the window. “Is that okay?”
David moved his hands through the panel. “No, that is definitely not okay.” He moved to a different panel beside him. “They programmed us to head straight for Earth, and I don’t have the codes to stop us.” He palmed his forehead. “They knew this ship would never survive re-entry!” He took a deep breath and started pushing invisible buttons.
“What are you doing?” Dad asked.
“Letting everyone know we’re in trouble. On every possible channel.” He looked up. “They sabotaged us, just in case we got out. They’re propelling us toward Earth with no way to escape.”
The ship joggled. “What was that?” I asked.
David winced. “Earth’s gravitational pull.”
The cool, calculated visage of Major Tomás Martinez coated Dad’s face. “Will your friends get here in time?”
Earth filled the view screen. The floor rattled through my sneakers, jostling my bones to the point of shattering.
David shook his head. “That was the last of our time.” His gaze panned to the window. His cheeks darkened with a violet hue.
“What does that mean?” I asked.
He turned to me. His eyes wide and seeking, digging into my heart and settling himself inside, but he was already there. He had been since we first met.
David caressed my cheek with the hand that had lost its human covering. His Erescopian skin scorched my jaw, but I stood still, hardly breathing, soaking in his eyes. What was it? What was he thinking?
The burn turned to a tingle that shot into me, searching through every cell and stroking each part of me before drawing back and away.
His gaze moved to my father. Dad winced and shook his head. When their gazes met again, Dad nodded. His features hardened past the toughened appearance of a seasoned soldier. Had David done something to him? Said something to him?
David gripped my hand. “We have to go. Now.”
39
I stumbled as David pulled us to the back of the ship, stopping in front of the escape pods.
There were only two.
Oh, God. I spun around. “Don’t you dare!”
Both Dad and David shoved at the same time, backing me into the glass tube. The thick, clear barrier sealed instantly.
A numbness swept over me. There was only one escape pod left, and the two people I loved most in the word were still outside.
I slapped my hands against the glass. “Don’t do this! There’s plenty of room in here. We can fit two people in one.” They both looked away. “No! Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare!”
David placed his hand on the wall beside me, and the other tube opened. He picked my backpack up from the floor and tossed it inside. His muffled voice permeated the glass. “Her camera is in here. She’ll want those pictures.”
Dad nodded. “Yeah, and you’ll be giving them to her.”
No!
David’s nose flared. “I won’t, sir. She needs her father. You’re one of the few things always on her mind.”
“Your people need you, David.” Dad pointed at the escape pod. “Get in the damn tube!”
The ship shook around us. My heart thumped, ripping through my chest.
David lowered his eyes. “You’re right.” He glanced at me and stepped toward the other escape pod.
I banged on the window. “There has to be another way!”
They both acted like they couldn’t hear me. Idiotic, stupid, self-righteous—
At the entrance, David turned, grabbed Dad’s arm, and threw him inside. The door sealed.
Dad smashed his fist against the glass. “Dammit, David, open this door.”
“Take care of her for me,” David said.
A deep hum filled my escape pod. David’s gaze trailed to the ceiling, then to me. The ship rumbled as if we were on top of a clothes dryer. He closed his eyes and leaned his forehead against the glass.
I met his touch from within. Tears streamed down my cheeks and dripped onto the floor. “Please, David. Open the door. There’s enough room for both of us.”
He took a step back. “There won’t be.”
“Please don’t do this. Dad’s right. Your people need you.” My lips twisted. “I need you.”
His fingers traced my face through the glass. “Nothing is more important to me than you.”
“I’m not important. I’m nothing. Nothing!”
His eyes teared. “You’re wrong. Your life will always be worth more than mine.” His face hardened.
“David!”
He punched his fist beside the glass, and my body flung against the back of the tube. The walls of the escape pod came to life, instantly forming a soft restraint around me. David’s ship became smaller as I jettisoned away. I tried to scream his name, but my voice was lost inside the constant vibration, the rattling, the whirr of unimaginable speed.
I pitched forward as if hitting something. Dad’s pod rolled over mine, window to window. The clunk of bolts locking into place thumped through the chamber. Had we been connected the whole time?
A grimace disfigured Dad’s face. His cheeks stretched and bobbled as his knuckles whitened on his restraints.
We spun. Slowly at first. Within a few seconds I had no idea which way was up.
Dad’s lips moved constantly. His gaze fixed on my face.
I gasped as moist warmth encompassed me, but the dampness abated, leaving only the scorch of increasing heat behind. Sweat soaked my hair and dripped into my eyes. My head rattled. My mother’s necklace drifted out of my blouse and seemed to hang before me. Struggling to move, I reached for the oval. The metal burned my hand, but I didn’t let it go.
I closed my eyes and gritted my teeth. I would live. I had to. This couldn’t be the way it would end.
We slammed into something. I scrunched my face to keep my eyes closed. We thudd
ed and banged again. And again. And again.
My eyes shot open. Dad’s lips continued to ramble words I couldn’t hear as we turned over more times than I could count. My mind reeled, focusing on everything and nothing. The edges of my necklace cut into my palm, but the pain was distant, ghostly.
We crunched to a stop.
The jolt tossed me toward the glass, testing my restraints.
Every muscle in my body quivered, but I couldn’t move. I couldn’t feel.
I could see, but only directly in front of me. Only Dad. My eyes wouldn’t move anywhere else.
I was alive. Wasn’t I?
Dad blinked and pulled his arms free. With the grace of a swinging monkey, he pulled himself up and out of my line of sight. I wanted to look up, to follow him, to scream for help, but nothing worked. I was frozen.
A sizzle hissed and a pop burst above my head. Light flooded the chamber.
“Jess, you okay?”
I wanted to scream yes, but I couldn’t.
Maybe I wasn’t okay.
His hands crammed beneath my shoulders, and I rose from the ship and into the sunlight. I squinted as the rays reflected off miles of sand in every direction.
Dad shook me. “I said, can you hear me?”
I inhaled a deep, full breath that burned my lungs.
Air. Life.
My life. Dad’s life.
A few wispy clouds billowed overhead, somber among the blue sky.
“Oh, Dad.” I slid my arms around him.
“I got you, Pequeña. It’s okay. I got you.”
I sobbed into his shoulder. It wasn’t okay.
When we’d crashed on the green planet, David fled in an escape pod. This time, he’d given those escape pods to us. He saved Dad and me, knowing he’d have no way to save himself. How could I live with that, knowing what he sacrificed? I didn’t care what David said. My life was not worth more than his.
A flash of light beamed overhead, shining like a miniature sun. I tightened my grip on my father’s shoulders. He flinched and a tiny sound gurgled from his throat. The same sound he always made when the other team scored a winning field goal: the subdued sound of defeat.
Come on, David. You’re smart. A genius. Think your way out of this. Please, David. Don’t give up!
The light brightened, and my heart leaped. Had he found a way to stop his descent?
Dad’s arms turned to rocks and tightened. Something shot out from the brightness, trailing a fiery tail toward the planet. Then two bright specs shot out from the other side. I froze, stunned as David’s ship broke apart. Numbness crept into my depths.
“No,” I whispered, tears streaming into my mouth.
A pop rang through the sky, not much louder than a gunshot from that distance, and the bright spot burst like a firework in the daytime. Dozens of fiery trails reached out and sped to Earth.
“No!” My scream blistered my ears. “No!”
I tried to pull from Dad’s arms, but he constricted like a python.
This wasn’t real. It was a dream. A terrible nightmare. I needed to wake up. If I didn’t open my eyes, I knew I’d die. I couldn’t take it. It wasn’t fair.
Pieces of David’s ship splintered and burned to dust overhead. Trails of smoke spun to the planet, disintegrating with the last pieces of my heart, drifting into oblivion.
“No. No. No. No. No!” I beat my father’s chest with my fists.
“Shhhh.” He grabbed my wrists, and I fell to my knees in the sand. “He knew the risks, Jess. He knew the risks, and he still chose to save us.”
“He can’t be dead.” I searched the sky, but only fading lines of smoke remained. “This isn’t happening.”
Dad folded me back into his arms. “David was as brave as any soldier I’ve met. He made the sacrifice we all know we might have to make someday, and I owe him. I owe him everything.”
A burning cinder flittered from above like a feather and settled to the ground beside me.
David. A life so bright, now belittled to nothing more than ashes in the sky.
Only hours ago, David had cradled me in his arms, keeping me warm within our special alcove on the green planet. Space and time had halted, giving us one precious moment to be together. Just us. Was that a gift? Did God know we’d be separated? Was this the plan all along?
No. I refused to believe that.
I broke away from Dad and ran into the desert.
“Jess, what are you doing?”
I didn’t answer. I didn’t know. But I wasn’t going to just sit there.
Smoke trailed up from the dunes in the distance. I ran for it, not caring what I might find. Dust kicked up around me: a cloud adding to the haze that already seared into my soul. My chest burned, and I stopped, resting on my thighs.
How could my body give up on David, when he’d sacrificed everything for me? I scuffed forward two steps before clutching my chest.
Dad appeared beside me, my backpack slung over his shoulder. “You can’t exert yourself like that in this heat. Your body isn’t used to it.” He rifled through my pack and handed me the canister of water I’d thrown in there while cleaning up our campsite on the green planet.
The clear liquid swished inside the nearly opaque flask.
David had left that canister on the ground. He’d been the last one to hold it. I snatched the bottle from Dad and pulled it to my chest. As burnt as my throat was, how could I drink?
Dad’s eyes narrowed. “That’s water, isn’t it?”
I nodded and slipped the bottle back into my pack. “It was David’s.”
“Do you really think he’d want you to die of thirst after he … ” Dad looked down. “Never mind. I get it.”
He helped me limp to the base of the smoke trail. A small, twisted piece of glowing metal winked out as we approached. Hardened, like Earth metal. Dead.
I shielded my eyes from the sun and kept walking.
40
Dad kicked over the eighth piece of the ship we’d found, snubbing out the glowing embers. “I’m not sure what you think we’re going to find.”
I hugged my elbows. “I don’t know. I just … I don’t know.” I wiped my damp forehead on my sleeve. Every one of these specs of shining dust, every one of these dying embers, were a piece of my life. A piece of the life of a man who’d turned my world upside down, and then saved humanity and me. Twice. How could I give up on him, even if he were gone?
I shivered despite the heat.
Gone. Such a horrible word. So final. It all seemed unreal—even the desert sand. But the scorching grains beneath my sneakers were real. And blazing hot. I couldn’t dwell on the past until I dealt with the present. “How are we going to get out of here?”
“We were falling into Earth’s atmosphere in an alien spaceship. I’m sure NASA tracked us.” He squinted into the sky. “I’m surprised our boys aren’t here already.”
I kicked up the sand at my feet. The desert sprawled around us, not even a cactus in view. Maybe they couldn’t get to us. “Oh my God. You don’t think we’re in Iraq, do you?”
A smile almost touched his lip. “I don’t think so.” He inched beside a small boulder and sat, leaning back on the rock. He patted the sand beside him.
I shook my head. “I can’t.” I choked down a sob. “I just can’t. I need to do something.” I tugged my hair. “Anything. I don’t know!”
His eyes softened beneath beads of sweat along his brow. “I’m not saying we stop. Let’s rest for a second. Get our bearings.”
I nodded and rubbed my eyes. The wind swirled across the top of the sand, forming majestic ripples. So simple, nature. Life goes on. The world goes on. I cleared my throat and forced a gulp, trying to ignore the pain.
The emptiness inside slithered, dug, and crawled through my bones. There wasn’t much of me left after Mom died, and now the remaining pieces unraveled. I held my breath as the pain simmered into a tangled ball in
my chest.
I slumped to the ground and flopped my head on Dad’s shoulder. The sob finally broke free.
David was gone. It was over. Agony played soccer in my body, dropkicking my heart and puncturing my lungs. I couldn’t lose someone I loved again. I wasn’t strong enough.
Dad handed me the water bottle again.
“I can’t.” I hid further into his shoulder.
“What would David have wanted you to do?”
He’d want me to live. But I wasn’t sure how I could do that without him.
Dad waved the bottle in the air. It reminded me of that day at the lake when I was ten, when Dad and Mom played monkey in the middle with a water bottle. As usual, I was the monkey. Dad’s expression today was soft, loving. Just as it had been so many years ago. Maybe I did have something to live for.
I took the canteen, popped the lid off, and handed it back to him. “David would want me to share.”
Dad’s grin reached inside me and stole the pain. Some, but not all.
Tears streamed down my face as he took a sip and handed the bottle back. My hand trembled as I brought the canister to my own lips and let the warm water blanket my throat like a kiss from beyond. I swallowed another gulp, and nearly choked myself as a sob burst from the base of my spine.
Drinking the water seemed so final. Like I’d given up.
My blurry eyes scanned the miles of sand around us. As hard as it seemed, I needed to come to terms with …
The boulder behind us shifted. Dad startled and grabbed for a rifle that wasn’t there.
He cussed under his breath and pulled me to my feet. “That thing just moved.”
“I know.”
We backed up, but the boulder remained still. The rock was only about three feet wide. Could it have been one of those giant tortoise-things? Was there such thing as a desert tortoise? It wouldn’t look like a rock though, right?
Ashes in the Sky Page 24
