by Beth Reason
Chapter 5
"Follow me," Lynette had said. So I did. I was fried and wanted any kind of distraction I could find.
We walked down hallways, moved up elevators, went down more hallways and more and another elevator. If I lost sight of Lynette, I couldn't find my way back. For some reason, that lightened my mood and by the time we got to the deck, I was almost giggling.
"Are we supposed to be here?"
Lynette shrugged, then put her hand to the lock. It turned green and opened. "Apparently we are. Come on."
"I'm supposed to be hitting the holo with Marlon."
"Want to go back?"
I grinned at her. "No way."
She nodded. "Then let's go."
We walked into the large room and I caught my breath. It was an observation deck, a bubble, really, of that foot thick glass that covered everything else on this lone human outpost. There was a semi circle of about fifty seats in the center of the room, allowing those who sat a view of the outside world. I didn't see any lights on the roof, or even supports, for that matter. It was as if we were under a large, smooth bowl. And the sky was mine.
"Got your badge ready?"
"Huh?"
She rolled her eyes. "Follow me." We walked to two people enjoying the view. Lynette pulled me forward and tapped the badge on my chest. "Level G. We need this deck."
The two men quickly nodded. I noticed they were sitting there to eat their dinners, and they scrambled to pick up their supplies.
"Oh, no, now you don't have to leave," I began. Lynette elbowed me in my side to keep me quiet and stood with her arms crossed, friendly but serious. When the men nodded, I gave them a small shrug. After they left, Lynette went to the door and entered a code on the security panel. "What are you doing?"
"Keeping everyone else out for a while."
"You can do that?"
She flashed me a grin. "There are one or two perks to having Marlon as a brother." She flopped down on one of the seats in the middle and pressed a button on the arm. The chair reclined, and Lynette told me to join her.
"You didn't have to kick them out," I said.
"Oh just hush up and relax for awhile."
I sat back like her and looked up. My sky.
From the deck, you couldn't really see any of the huge buildings. They were positioned behind us when we sat on the chairs. It was nothing but wide open space. I felt a stab of homesickness, especially when a ship crossed overhead. For a split second I could swear I heard Ashnahta asking me where I thought that ship was going.
"Home," I whispered.
"What?"
I felt embarrassed, but...not. Not really. I guess I felt vulnerable. I wasn't exactly sorry I said it out loud. "I had this game with a friend. We'd watch the ships orbiting Laak'sa and when one would fire the drive to change course, we'd bet on where they were going."
"How did you know who was right?"
I am not supposed to talk about inspeaking. Ralph made that clear. Christophe made that clear. "Trackers, of course," I said. What did she know about deep space life? It was a good cover.
"And who was better at it?"
I laughed, thinking of my miserable record. "Ashnahta. Hands down. Which isn't surprising since she knows every nook and cranny of that place."
We were quiet for awhile. The sun was setting and before I knew it, the sky darkened and I could see the planets and stars. It was the same, but different, familiar but completely new. This was not my galaxy. And while I had a decent look at a bit of sky from my first room in the Utopia complex, this was the first time I truly got to see it all.
Except for when I was bobbing around out there after the jump, of course. There's no way I'll ever remember that.
A satellite crossed overhead, small but perfectly clear. It flashed its way across the deep sky. I watched it until it was over the horizon. Another ship came in to view, its thrusters glowing purpley blue in the night. I craned my head to follow its path up and over and behind us, and saw the reflection of the plasma thrusters mirror off the thick glass of one of the upper walkways of the compound. I turned back to the stars and planets. I looked for familiar clusters automatically. Of course I didn't find them. Instead, I found others. I looked at their structures, theorized about their potentialities, idly calculated the next move, should we have to.
I couldn't help it, you see. I am a product of my life. I'd spent sixteen years absorbing it all. My first memory is of Mother, Dad, Ralph, and Stephan over the projection map in the command room. I must have been laying down on the benches in front of the observation ports, because in my memory they are sideways. I'd consider a zero-g scenario, but they weren't floating. A nap, maybe. I must have been two, at the oldest, for Mother's hair was still long. I remember their faces, lit by the eerie green glow of the projection table, all frowning. Not angry, though, just heated. They were discussing the next move, trying to figure out which system was most likely to have life forms.
Like I said, I'd been doing it since birth. I'd been part of it, in it, around it, even if I couldn't participate. Later I did. Later it became a teaching exercise. They didn't just rely on my HuTA. There were plenty of lessons taught by Mother, Dad, and the rest of the crew. They loved to bring up the projection map and test me.
"Which one of these solar systems is most likely to have life?"
I'd look. I'd pretend to think, at first, but later really use my reasoning skills. There are many things needed for a planet to hold life. The first would, of course, depend on the star in the system. Too big, and nothing could live. Too small, and anything that was alive would long be frozen. Just right, and it was a start. But not the be all and end all. We saw many prime candidate stars reign over lifeless rocks. Dad always takes that personally.
"A waste of a perfectly good star."
There are billions upon billions of more, Dad. They can spare some.
What makes life spring up some places and not others? I suppose that's the huge question, isn't it? The one Mother wants to answer. Sometimes I think Dad's just along for the party. A good star is a start. Then there's the planets in the system. Too many, and the gravities seem to prevent anything real from forming. Or perhaps we just got there a few billion years too early. We never found any real life, anything more than the odd plant or slightly advanced algae, on a system with more than twelve orbiting planets.
To be fair, though, we've only been to a handful. That statement was just bad science on my part. Mother wouldn't be happy.
All of these things float through my head when I look out, really look out, into the sky. I can't help them. They're automatic. And as it turns out, it doesn't matter which galaxy I'm in. I'm going to do the same. My eyes are going to flick to clusters, picture the stars, guess at the planet count. I'll dismiss that cluster all together, because there are too many tiny stars and it's too new to have anything of value. That one over there has potential, even though it's got the signs of an impending nova since the star itself looks a little orange. That band there, now that has some real possibilities.
Yes, it was all different, but the same.
"Where's Earth?" My voice echoed loudly in the large, empty dome.
Lynette was lost in her own thoughts and took a second to answer. "Hm?"
"Earth. Which one is Earth?"
"Oh. Um...hang on." She pulled her holo from the clip on her waist and turned it on. The light from the little holo filled the dark deck and glowed on her face. "Let me just input our coordinates and we'll see."
"You have to look it up?"
She shot me a quick look. "We're not all astronomers, Jake."
"But you come from there."
"Well, yeah, but that doesn't mean I can point it out in the middle of all that," she said, waving a hand toward the sky. "Can you point out your Laksa?"
"Laak'sa," I corrected. "And no. I can't." She quirked her eyebrow and gave me a smug look. She thought she made a point. "It's in a different galaxy, remember?"
Lynette looked back on her holo. "Oh." Oh is right. I bit back my own smug smile. She tapped on the screen, then looked up, then back, then up again and finally said, "Oh hell. I don't know."
I held my hand out and she put the holo into it. I glanced at the astro-chart, then looked up. "There." Clear as day right over the horizon. I should have noticed it on my own with its odd blue tint. If I had been around Ralph, I would have been embarrassed that I needed the astro-chart. Since Lynette still couldn't find it even using the chart, I had no shame. I even rubbed it in a bit. "Not bad for someone new to the galaxy, hm?"
"So I'm not an astronomer. Big deal. Name me ten of the top actors on Earth. No? How about the two top presidents? Hot bands? Fashion trends?"
"Okay, okay. I get your point."
"And I'd like to point out that if you'd been paying better attention to me this week, you would be able to name those things."
I could have defended myself. I could have easily pointed out a list of excuses a mile long, not the least of which being that I was from a different galaxy entirely and she was expecting me to absorb a lifetime of pop culture in one little week. I didn't defend myself. "I'm trying. President Joshua Norton, representative of the United States, and President Nari Gundani, from...uh...Germany?"
"Oh hell no! That's one you can't mess up on. India. Grundani, India. Jeez, you could start a war otherwise!"
"I am trying," I said quietly. "It's just...so much."
"I know. I'm sorry. I just...I can't afford to fail at this job."
"Why?"
She gave a snort. "It won't make any sense to you." When I shrugged, she returned the gesture. "Okay. If you can't keep up, don't say I didn't warn you."
Lynette leaned back in her seat and stared at the horizon. "I've been with StarTech since I was seven years old. Sold, by my folks, to pay a huge and stupid debt. Me and Marlon both."
Slavery. I had thought it was illegal on Earth. That's what my HuTA taught me.
"We were enrolled in StarTech's main academy in the states and then shipped up here as soon as we turned twelve, as soon as it was legal. I've got one more year, if I do this right. I've worked my way to level E, one above Marlon. He won't get beyond D, by the way."
That surprised me. He's smart, once you get past the attitude. "Why?"
"The chip on his shoulder. He considers us slaves."
"Aren't you?"
She frowned. "No. Not really. No more than any other kid, when you think about it."
"But you were sent up here. You said yourself it was taking care of a debt."
"Right. I told you it's complicated. See, my folks, they owed StarTech for a loan."
"A loan?"
"Yes. StarTech's not just a bunch of space nerds, you know. They're the world's biggest financial institute. They run everything. You need money, you go to them."
"And your parents needed money."
"Yes. For stupid reasons. And when they couldn't pay up, StarTech gave them the standard out. They could indenture themselves, and work until the debt was paid off, or they could have members of their family stand in and be indentured on their behalf."
My stomach knotted. It was clear which option her parents chose. "So you and Marlon are working off their debt."
"Sort of. I said it's complicated and I meant it. We're kids. We can't do a straight payout, or else that really would be slavery."
"Sorry, but I don't see any differences."
She rolled in her reclined seat to her side to face me. "That's what Marlon says. There are differences, though. First, we don't really have work. We are put through school, just like other kids. I have chores, sure, but no more than other kids in their own homes. Once a week it's my turn to sanitize the bathrooms. I have to take the incineration cube to the trash once a month. We need to keep our rooms clean and tidy. And if I do my work late or slack off, I have to help with HuTA maintenance. No more than any other kid. Hell, you probably had more chores than I do." It's true. I did. "The only difference is that I do these things for StarTech, not my parents. Which is fine by me. They aren't much for parents."
It made sense, I suppose. "Okay, so you aren't a slave. But how does that pay off the debt?"
"It doesn't, not in itself. But every year, a few thousand kids are signed over to the program. And every year, a few thousand reach their maturity. Of those, ninety five percent sign on for StarTech contracts. Think about it. Yes, they invest in us as kids. But then we're tailor made. Take me. I'm going to be an anthropologist. Every single class of mine has been centered around that profession. Everything, even the maths and sciences. If you're a huge company that needs certain specialists, which is better for you? The kid who learned a bit of anthropology here and there and then didn't major in it until university, or the kid who was literally surrounded by it twenty four seven for nearly all their lives?" She shook her head. "Marlon sees it as devious. I see it as brilliant. Besides, we had a much better life with StarTech than we ever would have back home with dear old Dad."
I turned my head then, because looking at her was beginning to hurt. It wasn't inspeaking. It couldn't be inspeaking. But I did feel her pain. It was all over her face. I wanted to ask about her father, about the bitter look in her eyes when she talked about him. I wanted to know what and why and how. And...I didn't. I looked instead at the stars above us. Moments, minutes ticked by. She wanted me to talk about it. I don't know why, or how I knew. It was an overwhelming feeling coming from her. She wanted me to ask, so she could say. She wanted this understood, wanted me to know these things about her. Maybe it's a kind of inspeaking. It was almost as clear.
But what could I say? What could I ask? What was safe, what wouldn't hurt? If I was Dad, what would I ask this new tribe member?
"Will you work for them when you're done school?"
"Yes. After graduation I plan on signing up for a ten year term. Four more of education, then six of employment."
"For pay?"
"Of course for pay. I told you, Jake. We're not slaves."
I shook my head. "I don't understand this money thing." I thought I did. I thought it was just like the trading on Laak'sa, or the barter on v-2445. "How is the debt paid if you get paid? Isn't that just the company spending more money?"
"And what's money? I'm paying with my experience, my expertise."
I had to smile. "Humble."
She laughed. "I can't help it if it's the truth. I'm very good at what I'm doing. Top in my classes."
I heard the pride, almost felt it. "And Marlon?"
She rolled over quickly and looked up at the sky. "Marlon's an idiot."
I gave a laugh. "So you got all the brains, eh?"
"No. Actually I didn't. He's brilliant, technically. A genius in fact. His IQ is disgusting it's so big. He just behaves like an idiot."
"Because he feels like you're slaves."
"Yes."
"Maybe he's right?" I felt her turn to look at me. "If he's such a genius, like you say, maybe he's right about it. What kind of company buys kids?"
Her voice let me know she was on the edge of angry tears. "What kind of parents sell them?" She stared at me. I could feel the stare like a sharp force coming from her recliner. "Tell me that, Jake. What kind of parents write a kid off? Can you imagine what life was like with people who can do that? Not just for me and Marlon, but for all the kids that get written off. Sure. If my life with my folks was sunshine and roses, I'd probably look at things differently. But it wasn't. They sent us packing to StarTech and I finally got good meals. I was able to sleep, not just here and there, but all night straight without drunk and stoned strangers wandering into my room looking for a..." She stopped suddenly and sat up. I glanced over and her back was to me, her shoulders hitching. She was crying. I made her cry.
"Lynette..."
"No. Don't. It's not your fault." She made a little hiccup noise and turned around. She was crying, and I felt like a crumb. "I get that to someone outside it might seem lik
e StarTech is the monster here. But I'm telling you, there was a need for them in our society. It's awful that's what it comes down to, but being awful doesn't change things. There have always been, and always will be, horrible excuses for human beings who should never have children, but do anyway. And there has always been and always will need to be a place where these kids can go. At least we live in an age where that doesn't mean slave labor in a governmental orphanage." I had no idea what that was, but I didn't think it was important enough to interrupt what she was saying with stupid questions.
"Marlon, he'd like to change the past. He's so smart that he actually thinks he can." She tapped her head. "He's got himself convinced that our memories lied, that Dad was actually just a poor unfortunate, down on his luck, and in a moment of weakness caved to the big bad monster corporation. Sometimes it happened just how you remember, even if that memory sucks. There's a reason we both wake up crying sometimes. There's a reason neither of us can find that damned planet in the night sky. You want to go home because your home is worth going back to. Mine? It's an intellectual study. It's fascinating only because I have the luxury of not having to be a part of it anymore."
She wasn't crying by the end. She was back to explaining. I sat up. I sat on the edge of my recliner, my knees almost touching hers. I wanted to reach out and...what? I didn't know what to do. Ashnahta would die before actually crying in front of a male. And Little Blob...he was just a pal. It wasn't really the same thing. So I sat there in my confusion and did nothing.
Lynette looked up at me and gave a wan smile. "You ever read any of the old sci-fi stories?" I shook my head. "Science fiction. It was very popular, especially in the early twentieth century. It was all fanciful ideas, about robots and space travel and aliens long before anyone actually had the technology to start finding the answers. It's funny to look back now and see where they were wrong, and where those dreamers were somehow right. StarTech teaches that those stories made space travel possible, that they ignited a flame and an interest in the general population to start to look at making it reality."
"Do you think so?"
"From an anthropological stand point? Absolutely. It's reverse story telling. They told the stories of the future, and then people took them and formed the future out of it. They're fun. You should look in to them." She waved a hand. "My point is, Marlon's a huge fan of them. They tend to revolve around worst case scenarios. Aliens eating off faces, or nuclear holocaust, or big bad companies secretly controlling the world. They play on the deep fears of the unknown we all have."
Now she was back in teacher mode. It was almost automatic to start tuning her out. Maybe I would have if she hadn't just spilled her guts to me.
"Well," she said after a second. "Maybe not you. You got to live the sci-fi stories." I had to snort at that. I lived my life. There was no "fiction" about it. She tipped her head to the side, forgetting the lecture she just started. "You really met other species, didn't you?"
I wanted to bristle at the tone, but I was starting to understand. It wasn't meant as derogatory. It was just...they don't know any better. "People. Other kinds of people."
It seemed that it was her turn to pry into my life. I was oddly okay with that. "What did you call them?"
"Ehkin and Qitani, but to be fair we really met many others. Those are the only two cultures we found a way to communicate with."
"The Ehkins are the blob people?"
I gave a three count in my head, fighting back the instant feeling of offense. "Yes," I tried to say as calmly as possible. They do look like blobs, after all. She was being descriptive, not prejudice. "Though once you get to know them, you'll figure out that the blob shape is only the skin. Underneath they have very complex cartilage systems." I surprised myself with the technical sounding language. I suppose I paid more attention than any of us thought. I bet Mother would have been very pleased.
"And they can speak?"
No talking about inspeaking. It was a clear no-no. "We found a way to communicate. However, Mother wasn't very interested in them, so we only stayed on v-2445 for a little less than a year before the Qitani invited us to Laak'sa."
Lynette pulled her legs up and hugged them, getting comfortable. "Why wasn't your mom into the Ehkin?"
"They weren't very developed in terms of technology. They didn't mine their planet." Lynette looked as if she expected more. "No mining, no minerals. No minerals, no..."
"Metal," she said when it dawned on her.
"Exactly. They build with plant materials only."
"So they're primitive."
That did rub me the wrong way. She sounded like Mother. "No, they aren't. They choose a life of peace and simplicity to give them enough time to devote to their art and studies."
She held her hands up quickly. "Hold on. I wasn't trying to push your buttons, Jake. No need to get defensive. You've got to understand, in terms of humanity and our way of thinking, advancement means tools, mining, smelting ores to make better tools, weapons, technology. There's an established pattern of advancement."
"And you assume that's how it has to be everywhere."
Lynette laughed. "Why not? We haven't learned anything else. I have to judge and guess by what I know."
"Bad science."
"I'm not a scientist."
I had to smile even though I wanted to be annoyed. I said that to Mother all the time. "No. You're not."
"So if that's not how it works everywhere, then tell me how it does work. How can they be so advanced if they have no tools?"
Uh oh. We were back in dangerous territory. Ehkin manipulated their environments, just not in the same ways we do. I'm sure it's too close to inspeaking for me to talk about. "They are very artistic." That's a safe side. "They'd much prefer to spend the day contemplating the universe than building fancy cities or ships. They don't need much in the way of tools, because there isn't much to build. What they need, the marshy lands supply. Little Blob..."
"Oh, so you can call him a blob but I can't?" She was giving me a wry smile.
I shrugged. "It's the closest word out loud we could come up with. A more direct translation would probably be something like... 'little amorphous gelatinous progeny'. To make it shorter, we just called him Little Blob. They name with descriptions. His father's name would roughly be along the lines of 'great mass with one unusual lump to the left of the primary hump'."
"Doesn't exactly roll of the tongue."
I laughed. "No. I guess not." But they didn't say it out loud, so it didn't need to. They only felt it. That's why they were more advanced, because they were connected to everything. They didn't look at their trees...they felt them. They created their art in homage to the beauty of a universe we could only actually look at and never fully accept. They didn't kill because they can feel the loss of a single atom. They didn't need metal because the land was perfect and untouched. They didn't say, they felt. They did. They prayed and sang because they had really had it all figured out.
I wished I could tell Lynette. I thought she may actually understand in a way that Mother never did. Success doesn't have to be the same for every tribe. The Qitani understood the beauty and place of the Ehkin. They allowed themselves to learn so much, and Mother made us so limited.
"Did I say something to make you mad?"
She was frowning, biting her lip. I flashed a quick smile. "No. Just thinking. Sorry."
"You miss them, don't you?"
I shrugged. "Wouldn't you?" I leaned back and laid in the chair again, putting my hands behind my head and staring up into the void of space above us in the night skies of Mars. "I was in a ship with twenty seven other people my whole life. Mother, Dad, Ralph, Daniel, Stefan, Angie, Clara, Alex... They were all I knew. How to explain it? Okay, you went to school, you were in a classroom, right? How many were in your class?"
"Before I left Earth? I don't know. Thirty, I guess."
"Right. And how many other people did you see every day? I'm not talking about people you
know. I'm talking about population, swarming around you every single day. Dozens? Hundreds? Thousands?"
"Sure."
"And I had twenty seven. And only twenty seven. There was no one I passed on the way to school, because there wasn't school. I didn't meet new people in the store, because there wasn't a store to go to. And even if there was a store on ship, which I suppose there was of sorts, the only people I could ever possibly run in to were the twenty seven I already knew."
"It sounds lonely."
I shrugged. "I don't know. It was just how my life was. I didn't think of it as lonely. You can't think of things you have no concept of, you know? I was a good ten, eleven before it dawned on me that there honestly was a planet filled with billions and what that might be like."
"You didn't know about Earth?"
I flashed her a grin. "Of course I knew about it from my folks, my HuTA. But it wasn't until we landed in the same region of the Ehkin homeworld and Laak'sa that I got to see life. Real life. Teeming life. There are many inhabitable planets in that sector. It lies near a nursery. Many young solar systems with perfect suns. Anyway, I believe I was ten the first time I stepped out onto a real planet. I'd been on plenty of dead ones. Some large asteroids, too. It was fun. But it was still only twenty seven possible relationships in the void of space."
"Until Ehkin."
I shook my head. "No. The Ehkin were a little later. It was a small planet, in a system of seven. There was life on it. Animals. Real animals, the first I ever saw. Nothing Mother could communicate with, and there were no signs of organized civilization, so we didn't stay. But we stepped out and something got curious."
"What?" Lynette almost whispered. I glanced over because of her tone and was pleased to see she was interested in knowing. She almost hovered on the edge of her seat.
"I don't know. We didn't even stay long enough to name them. Mother would have taken one for a sample, but Dad talked her out of it. They were small bipeds with enormous eyes. I think it was the eyes that got to Dad. You could see the thoughts there. They were intelligent. Like Earth apes. Intelligent, and no doubt if we could get back there in a few million years they could shake our hands and invite us in for coffee." I grinned again. "That's what Dad said, anyway."
"So the were little monkeys?"
"Sort of. They had no fur, though. Completely bald because of their environment. It was a very hot planet. And musty. We couldn't remove our gear because it tested too low for our oxygen needs. But we kept having to wipe the visors because they fogged up in the humidity. We landed and just stood there looking around. Mother and Alex were taking measurements of temperatures, gathering soil samples. The only reason we landed in the first place is because Dad was set on at least sampling the land even if it didn't have people. The first one came up to us and was not at all afraid. Dad said that was because he saw no signs of large predators."
"Like when our dinosaurs died." She was smiling.
"Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe there never were large beasts there. Who knows? Anyway, it came up to us. Dad called them 'homospacians', just to annoy Mother." Lynette laughed. "He came walking up and started to fiddle with the clasps on Dad's boots. He looked like he was trying to figure them out. Then he made a sound and others came, all looking us up and down, all chattering, some of them testing the taste of our suits with long tongues. Dad picked one up carefully and looked at it. It got mad and batted at Dad's hands, but when Dad opened his grip it didn't leave. And they just stood there looking at each other." It was one of the best memories I have of my father and bringing it up also brought a pain. I missed Dad most of all.
I cleared my throat to keep the pain in check. "Anyway we were surrounded, and it was the first time I really thought about being surrounded by people, having more than just twenty seven in a tiny ship as a life."
"And then you met Little Blob."
"Yes."
"And...I'm sorry. What was her name?"
The pain tightened. I know I should have given back what she gave me. I should have allowed her the same personal access she allowed me. She cried. She was vulnerable. But I couldn't. I just lay there, looking at the sky, trying to think of anything but Dad, my family, my friends.
"Wow, you really meant it when you said it was off limits. That's fine." Lynette's voice didn't sound like it was fine. She sounded exactly like Daniel when the crew would tease him about his cooking.
"Lynette..."
"No. I get it. Too personal."
Now Lynette sounded like Ashnahta when I wouldn't do as she asked. She looked like her, too. Made the same face, crossed her arms just like her. Suddenly the similarities overcame the differences. Girls are the same the universe over. Dad always said so, said it was why Mother and Morhal clashed so often. I never understood it until that exact moment. What do you know? The old man was right. I couldn't help it and laughed.
She frowned. "What's so funny?" I laughed harder, because I knew what she was going to say. I knew the scene. I could call it. I knew the look, the posture...everything.
I finally found something familiar!
Lynette looked at me with her eyebrows up and slowly shook her head. "You've cracked. He thought you might, and sure enough you have."
I wiped my eyes and took a deep breath, feeling something deep inside relaxed for the first time since I arrived at Utopia. "Who thought I'd crack?"
"Marlon. He thinks you're slow and weak and stupid."
I sighed. Way to kill a good mood. "I am slow and weak. That's changing. I'm not stupid, though."
"That's what I told him. But he says you keep failing his tests."
I had to defend myself against that one. "Have you ever tried to pass one of his little tests? He wanted me to rewire the circuit board of an older model HuTA, one that's about ten levels above the only one I've ever known by the way."
Lynette nodded. "Yep. Sounds like Marlon. What did he want you to make it do?"
"Convert the fah'ti Qitani signals from whatever the Qitani used to something our own communications devices can understand."
She swore and pulled out her holocom, then began typing something.
"What?"
"He's not supposed to be doing that."
"He said everyone who's anyone is trying to crack it."
Lynette made a frustrated little squeak. "Haven't you figured out yet that he's not anyone? He's about two levels too low to even know about it existing!"
"But you know."
She shot me a quick look, then went back to keying something in. She was typing angry. I suddenly felt a pang of guilt, a little loyalty to my tormentor. I know how girls are when they're mad. I can't imagine how much worse it is when it's your sister, someone who knows everything about you and every button to push. When she finished she turned to me and began grilling me like a seasoned interrogator. Then I really did feel for Marlon.
"How much work have you done on it?"
"I don't know. A couple hours the last few days. We've only been trying since Wednesday."
"On what?"
"The HuTA."
"Anything else?"
"No."
"No holos?"
"No."
"No stations?"
"No."
"Base terminals?"
"I said nothing else. Just the HuTA."
"And it was a retired bot?"
I shrugged. "How the hell would I know? Marlon gave it to me and told me to try and work it out."
"And what was he doing?"
"I don't know. Something with Ralph."
"And did you crack it?"
I had to laugh. "Would he call me an idiot if I did?"
"Quite possibly."
"No, I didn't crack it. I didn't get the bot to do anything but spit out jokes instead of history lessons."
"So you did rework it."
"Some."
"Who knows about it?"
"I don't know."
"Was anyone else around when you were doing that?"
"I don't think so."
"And where?"
"What do you mean? In our quarters."
"No," she said in a frustrated tone. "I mean where. Gym? Bedroom?"
"Oh. Uh, Marlon and Ralph were in Ralph's room, I think, and I was left to work in my room." In my closet space, actually.
See, I actually did have an idea we weren't supposed to be fiddling like that. Ralph broke it down for me without actually saying so. Even if he hadn't, I'm not too stupid to figure out that we were working on a project outside the scope of the cameras. Or not notice the buckets of sweat dripping down Marlon's face. Or pick up on the fact that the words were different than the looks and hand gestures. I got it.
The thing was, I had no idea what I was doing. I believe Marlon assumed that I know the most about the Qitani and that would most likely mean I could understand their programming. Ralph probably figured the same thing. While it was sort of true, I didn't exactly spend my time with Ashnahta learning the ins and outs of Qitani geekery, as Stefan called it. I knew the basics of human programming, just enough to keep a now ancient ship running in space, and that's it. I didn't even understand the wormhole jumping specifics that Mother was always trying to hammer into my head. If I couldn't even grasp our tech, why would anyone think I could understand a completely foreign system?
I can read Qitani passably. I sat in on lessons with Ashnahta. After struggle, I learned to speak it, though the words are not natural for our mouths to form. I am good at math, but that's only because it's so critical in Qitani trading and Ashnahta and I made quite a name for ourselves exploring the far reaches using my TrekMan, places where other Qitani could not travel deep in the marshlands. So I suppose it wasn't a terrible thought that I may know more.
Perhaps if I had more of the fah'ti side to go on, I would have been a bigger help. Marlon's access was...well, let's just tell it like it really was. He had stolen intel. He made a program to run under the radar and snatch data streams at random intervals from the lab working to crack the fah'ti code. To call the info sketchy would be building it up more than it was. The sum total we had to work with were a few thousand lines of actual code in Qitani runes, a chart, and what looked to be someone's supply list for the lab cafeteria. Not a lot.
"Just try," Marlon said.
I did. I translated some of the Qitani words, but others were beyond me. I had an idea that they might be acronyms, but without knowing more technical terms, I couldn't back that up. I spent hours trying and in the end figured I better do something, so I had the HuTA go through an old comedy routine Dad had programmed on mine to entertain me when I got bored. It was all in there anyway, you just have to know where to look.
My mistake was bringing it up to Lynette. I assumed she knew about it. As she sat there firing off questions fast as a proton jet, I thought maybe Marlon was right after all. Maybe I really was an idiot.
Her holo beeped and she picked it up. She scanned the words, her face turning red. Another familiarity, though this one not very comforting. I stood. I knew we'd be storming out of there in a huff any second.
Lynette scoffed and jammed her holo into the holder on her belt. "I can't believe him! If he wants to screw it up for himself, that's fine. That's just fine by me!" She stormed to the door and angrily punched in a code. "But if he screws things up for me...hoo boy he better hope he gets enough clearance to leave before me!"
She was shoving on the door trying to make it open faster, and I grabbed her arm. She stopped her tirade and turned to look at me. "I'm sorry," I said.
She got flustered. I didn't know why, but she sputtered, trying to say something, and turned red. I still don't understand that."It's...not your fault."
"I won't work on it anymore. I don't want you to get in trouble."
She took a deep breath and then let it out slowly. "You won't get me in trouble." She gave a quick little laugh. "Actually, since you outrank all of us, you already had the clearance to see any of those files."
"Then why didn't Marlon just have me get the files for him?"
"Because he's the great Marlon. Genius. Brilliant mind in a kid's body." She rolled her eyes. "He was hoping you'd do the work, crack the code, and then he'd swoop in to take credit. I'd bet my life on it. He just doesn't want to share the spotlight."
Ah. So like Stefan. Another thing clicked. If that was the game, then I knew how to play it. All week long I'd struggled to pin Marlon down, to get an idea how to deal with him. Lynette gave me the key. Maybe girls weren't the only things that were universal. Marlon was like Stefan. I should have put that together myself. Maybe I would have if he didn't spend so much time with Ralph. He barely gave me the time of day, just gave me boring lesson after boring lesson through a HuTA. Marlon's like Stefan. Bingo.
I realized I was still holding Lynette's arm, and let go suddenly feeling...I don't know. Embarrassed. I cleared my throat. "Yes. Well, I won't work on it. Not that way."
She tucked her hair behind her ear. "It's okay. Unless he's really lucky, he won't be in any shape to hack after tonight." She cracked her knuckles and gave me an evil little grin.
"Thanks for bringing me here," I said, truly meaning it.
She smiled. "Now. Let's go kill a brother, shall we?"
