Chapter 20
CHAPTER
TWENTY
CHRYS
I’m not sure we can call what we fall into a ‘routine,’ but the days follow a sort of pattern.
We wake up, eventually drag ourselves out of bed, make plans, wind up back in bed, manage to eat at random intervals, cuddle, and sometimes we even enact the morning’s plans.
Shock slowly accepts that Arc is going to circle the Zone once a day no matter what.
Despite all of my concerns, it does get easier to do more than fuck.
Three days ago, I would not have thought it possible that we’d be sitting around the living room fire, touching but not crawling all over each other.
Arc smiles. Because we might not be doing it right now, but I’m always thinking about it.
So are we.
I hold myself so still, listening, trying to tell if what I heard was real or just a figment.
Setting his tablet aside, Arc turns to me, hands clasped elbows on knees, watching my face.
A dozen thoughts zing around my head like I’m a human pinball machine, but I think they’re all mine.
“Trying again?” Shock asks from the other side of the couch, lying across Risk’s lap in an odd mirror of the way Kissu lies across mine.
They’d mentioned that some of the other women had seemingly picked up parts of their mate’s mutations. And Arc was certain I’d heard his thoughts while we were in bed… “I got nothing.”
When I think I might, they’re just whispers and when I try… Well, even if I could hear their thoughts, my own drown them out.
Kissu fusses and Arc immediately looks down at my feet. “Where are your socks?”
“In the other room.” I haven’t felt as cold lately, but I think that’s because I’ve had plenty of exercise to keep my blood flowing.
He looks at me like he wants to scold me but then Kissu slides down to the floor, wrapping himself around them instead.
“He’s just informed me that he will keep you warm even if you’re not paying enough attention to do it yourself.”
“I’ll go get them right now.” I pet his head, and he lets me get up but follows me to my room and pulls out more than just socks for me to put on.
Having Kissu is a little like having both a toddler and a nanny. But I can’t imagine him not being around anymore.
Once he’s satisfied with my layers, he nudges me back out to the front, using his big head to steer me.
“How long do you think we should wait to register the bond?” Risk asks, tracing patterns over Shock’s chest. “Eventually, it is going to be a problem for her, and probably for us too.”
“I promised to meet up with Mary sometime this week. I’ll tell her then.”
They all look at me with confused glances, and then Arc says something in Sianese and it’s my turn to look confused.
“I think,” he says in English this time, “That you understand Sianese if you’re not paying attention to the fact that it is Sianese?”
“What?” That doesn’t make any sense.
“None of what we said while you were out of the room was in English.”
“So the whispers are real and I might know things as long as I don’t realize I know them…” I look at Shock, “If I start dreaming about the future, I am going to flip out.”
They all share a look. “Should we tell Jessica? I don’t know how quickly this happened for the others.”
“Oh, she does not get to barge into this yet.” I go and plop down on the cushion next to Arc. “She’s already taken enough of my blood and hasn’t even told me why, who knows what else she’ll want.”
“Fine, but if something big changes… we are going to ask for help.”
Because Arc was the one who says it, I’m unnerved enough to agree. “Okay.”
Risk studies my face for a moment and says something in Sianese. No… not something…
How
The words form in my head like letters drawn in thick pea soup.
Do
How do…
I should probably apologize to Arc as I scream at my own mind to hurry up.
You
I take a deep breath and stop trying to understand it.
“How do you feel?”
“Frustrated.” I look at them and try to push that away because I know that they feel what I feel in the bond, even if it is a much diluted version of it. “It didn’t work for Spanish, but maybe immersion would help me in this?”
Shock asks Risk a question in Sianese and I don’t catch half of it, but I’m pretty sure the answer was yes.
So when Risk says ‘yes,’ I at least know my instincts are still on point.
RISK
Shock and Arc are downstairs, installing the pole that was just delivered into the gym when the comm tone echoes overhead.
Chrys looks at the screen and then at me and tips back the last of her water before placing her glass into the washer.
When I answer the call, Drift’s face fills half of the screen for a moment before he sits back. “I have bad news and I have worse news. Which do you want to hear first?”
“Worse, please.” Chrys drops onto the couch beside me and curls her legs under her.
He didn’t expect her to be here and he’s not particularly happy that she is, but there’s no reason for her to not hear what he has to say.
“I don’t like talking to Tylen. He knew the Maker. He knew what he was doing. He didn’t care, so… he’s not a good guy.”
He was too focused on his own experiments to care about us, but that’s not an excuse.
“But, he’s a resource, one I can’t justify giving up just because I don’t like him. I asked him about the man who made kirocilicantephen and… it’s not good.”
“How not good is it?” Chrys wraps her arm around mine and squeezes me close.
“He was banned from working with humans, and he was basically removed from every board and body he was ever a member of.”
By Tylen and a few other people who were nearly as bad, if not worse.
“So he went underground?” Chrys asks, and I clarify what the idiom means to Drift.
“Yes. He’s officially registered as a teacher, but I think we can guess where the black-market version of the kirocilicantephen came from.”
Shifting beside me, Chrys asks, “What’s the bad news?”
“I haven’t gotten to the end of the worse news yet.”
“Uh oh.” She whispers it quietly enough I know Drift didn’t hear her.
I know what the worse news is, so I ask the question that will get him to spit it out.
“Where is he, and why wasn’t he the first person they went to when they figured out what it is?”
“His last known address is in Calisan.” Drift scowls at Arc and Shock who’ve just joined us. “The timing of all of this is unsettling.”
“And the bad news?” Chrys asks again.
“Noa’s people will be lifting out the rest of the wreckage. The fuel cells have burned out and he wants the pieces in a secured facility.”
“So, lots of air traffic and bodies messing with the sensors.”
He nods. “They’ll start in a few days.”
“Noted.”
When he hangs up, I look at the others. “You know what that means, don’t you?”
Arc grimaces at the screen. “I have to go back to Calisan.”