Chapter 26 #2
“Nothing that can’t be undone with a power cable. Hopefully. Bill Corrie if I fuck it up.”
Evelyn took the communicator from Veselko and held it up to show the charge indication was at eighty-nine percent.
She held the communicator in her hands and felt the subtle warmth of the energy of the device resonating with her own.
She closed her eyes as the faint glow started to emanate from the device and energy flowed into her body.
When warmth dissipated, she opened her eyes to see the three of them staring at her, open-mouthed.
Veselko cleared his throat.
“Uh, so do you have any interest in a life of crime?”
Nannette turned out to be somewhere in the middle of the two main schools of thought on training. Also, she had promised to blast her with a non-lethal pulse if Evelyn started to exhibit signs of megalomaniacal delusion.
Safety first.
“You need to master basics before you can start to fool around with more advanced techniques. Doesn’t matter if you’re working with knives or blasters or with your mind,” she’d said, leading Evelyn to the armory to find a blaster that fit the bill.
Technically, it was staged as the ship’s gym, but when you were smugglers, you made use of every available space at your disposal.
There were special panels in the walls that slid out to hide their arsenal.
Nannette was the only one of the crew who voluntarily took full advantage of the room, using every machine and gadget in the place.
Elenor used the treadmills without being reminded to, and the guys came in to lift weights, but they all completely ignored the large matted area that Nannette used to run drills.
“So I should just take Corrie’s stupid note and run with it?” Evelyn asked.
“I think she was being a bit simplistic, but she’s not entirely wrong.”
Nannette’s thinking on the matter was fairly linear.
How much energy transfer could Evelyn do in a sitting?
Did she have limits? If so, what were they?
Were there ways around them? Each question led to another, as Evelyn could only really shrug her shoulders and reply with a halfhearted, “I dunno,” her embarrassment and shame at her own ignorance about her ability mounting.
The only way to find the answers was to sit down and mess around with the pile of electronics in her storage space.
They’d gone back to the storage room, and Nannette had watched Evelyn drain the power from her gadgets one by one, taking notes on her communicator, and then helped Evelyn plug everything back into their respective chargers.
Now they sat on the mat in the gym, feet pressed against each other, hands linked, stretching out. Evelyn felt energized from using her talent so much in such a short space of time.
“What’s happening with the energy? Are you storing it in your body?” Nannette asked.
“Maybe? I feel sort of keyed up, like I’ve just had six shots of espresso.”
Nannette arched an eyebrow. “And you’ve never tried to reverse the process?”
Evelyn shook her head. “Never. Corrie drilled it into my head that I shouldn’t let anyone know what I could do, so I did everything I could to avoid using it.”
Nannette nodded, her gaze becoming distant for a moment. Evelyn got the distinct impression she knew all about hiding.
“Don’t people with secondary psychic talents get a little loopy if they don’t use them?” Nannette leaned forward to reverse the stretch.
“Oh, absolutely. It’s a big part of why Tanalian society is so focused on celebrating talent. I’m lucky I had the Amplifying to fall back on.”
“Didn’t anyone question why you didn’t use any other talent?”
“I sort of faded into the background whenever I could. My sisters are both larger-than-life personalities so I got away with fading into the background.” They stopped stretching, and Evelyn reached for a bottle of water. “Do you have any siblings?”
“Nope.” Nannette said so flatly that Evelyn got the sense this was a conversational nonstarter.
“I always wanted to be an only child.”
“It’s not all it’s cracked up to be. There’s a lot of pressure. Focus. All on you.” Nannette got up and found two jump ropes. She handed one to Evelyn, who took it and sincerely hoped she wouldn’t break an ankle in her attempts to use it.
They jumped in place for a while. Evelyn focused on trying not to trip, while Nannette’s jumps gained in speed and force, like the thoughts of her past were fueling her.
Maybe that’s just how she jumps rope. Not everyone has a mysterious past. Stop projecting.
The third time Evelyn tripped, she bundled up her rope and went to replace it from the cabinet Nannette had pulled it from. She turned and almost screamed. Nannette was right behind her. She’d moved with such light footfalls, Evelyn hadn’t heard her at all.
“Are you part cat?” Evelyn held a hand over her chest.
Nannette gave a slight smile. “Sorry. Stealth is part of the job, you know.”
Evelyn nodded and dropped her hand. “Listen, sorry if I brought up something you don’t want to talk about. I get complicated family dynamics.”
Nannette nodded. She squared her shoulders, like she’d made a decision she was determined to follow through with. “No, it’s okay. You’re right, I don’t love talking about my family.”
“And you absolutely don’t have to! I overshare.”
She laughed. “You really don’t, Miss Hidden Skill Set.”
“You make a fair point.”
Nannette coiled the jump rope in her hands, looking at her work as if determined to create a perfect loop before putting it away.
When it could be coiled no more, she hung it up.
“When we were deciding if we wanted to come along and join your planetary coup, Aiden told me we could back out of it if I wanted to. Because of my father.”
Evelyn stayed silent. She could see the tension in the corners of Nannette’s eyes, the grip she had on her water bottle. Her stomach dropped as her mind raced. Getting other people hurt trying to clean up her own mess was the last thing she wanted to do.
“My parents were the leaders of the Cygnus Colony. Well, my father is. The governor. My mother’s background was scientific, and she continued her work on the colony after they married.
She died in a routine sample survey on one of the moons.
Equipment failure.” Nannette took a sip of water, and Evelyn could only imagine how dry her mouth was.
I can’t get through these sorts of talks without turning beet red. She’s so composed.
“My father didn’t take my mother’s death well.
He became obsessive about my schedule,” Nannette continued, stone-faced and even-toned.
The faint trembling of her water bottle was the only thing to give away her discomfort.
“My safety. My diet. My friends. My wardrobe. Any aspect of my life he could control, he did control, and he truly believes it was for my benefit. He managed my education, maneuvered my job prospects. His eventual goal was to elevate my status to the one my mother held.”
Evelyn’s stomach clenched. She didn’t like the way this was heading at all. “In . . . in more ways than one?”
Nannette nodded. Her fingers stopped trembling, but her eyes were lightyears away.
“Well, shit. How did you get away?”
Nannette smiled. “I met Aiden. They were doing a gig on the colony. I didn’t know that they were smugglers when I bribed him to let me hide on his ship. Little did I know where that would lead me.”
“Life beyond your wildest dreams?”
“It’s not a bad one,” she said, grabbing a set of sparring pads. “But I don’t want to keep running anymore. Especially not from a fight that’s worth fighting. So this is as much an experiment in freedom for me as it is for you.”
If they were successful, this would be galactic news.
The implications of that not only for Nannette, but for the crew at large staggered Evelyn.
Their livelihoods depended on their ability to blend in, and this sort of publicity could shatter that.
I’m sure they have a plan to spin things.
She felt a fresh surge of guilt for not considering that.
She’d been so focused on her own shame and guilt about her siphoning she’d allowed everything else to be eclipsed.
“Thank you,” Evelyn said. “For telling me. And for being here. I don’t know if they’ve told you or not, but you’re kind of a badass.”
Nannette laughed. “Certified, baby.”