Chapter 22 #2
“Speaking of data…” Kilo transfers his screen to the window in front of us and says, “Correct me if I’m wrong, but these are the outpost layouts, aren’t they?
“I mean… that’s mine.” He points at the one in the lower right corner… “but I don’t know what that is.”
There’s an auxiliary entrance and another room that he didn’t know about.
I pull our outpost to the front and expand it.
“Download these, please.”
“Already done.”
My skin crawls as I look at the space that is not what it should be. “Kissu said there were ghosts…” I point at the geomech room. “It looks like someone could have gotten into our outpost at any point they wanted to before we sealed up that door.”
There are three separate tunnels from it, hidden inside the machinery I’ve never bothered to inspect, and a massive room that is marked only as “lab.”
The crawling turns to static and I barely feel my hands as I raise my comm to my ear, hitting the only preset transmission code—Home.
All I get is harried beeping.
“We’re too far underground to get that signal out,” Riann tells us.
“I think we’ve seen enough here. We need to get home. Anything else buried here can wait.”
“Yeah…” Kilo thinks about Bowie and not wanting to leave him alone if someone else could get inside.
“Pack up anything you think we need and—”
Kilo takes a step back and curses as the power cuts, plunging us into darkness.
“Well… we know what the detonator did.”
“Do we?” Our lights are still on. Kilo checks his drone, it’s still hovering in the stairwell, waiting for a command.
But Riann’s comm is completely dead. The lights don’t come back on—not even emergency systems—and the computers in front of us might as well be giant bricks.
“I didn’t feel an explosion,” Kilo looks up. “If it was an EMP, our stuff would have cut too… and this would come back on…”
I don’t care what happened in this moment. I just want to get above ground and get a hold of Shock or Risk.
“Where does your tech come from?” Riann asks as we make our way out, but he seems to take the hint when neither Kilo nor I respond.
I have to remind myself again that he has a gun but he’s never used one. Let’s hope he doesn’t need to now, either.
The drone hums, waiting in the center of the stairwell for any kind of a command, and I hold Riann back as Kilo pulls the controller out and checks to ensure our route is clear.
While we wait, I pull the comm from my pocket, turn it over and hand it to Riann, manufacturer’s name up.
He stares at it for a long moment. Oh, fuck.
“What’s wrong?” I ask as quietly as I can.
“I always assumed you used the same stuff the fleet supplies. Our tech is their old cast offs. That’s what the fleet wishes they had. The maker doesn’t give up his toys to just anyone.”
For the first time in decades, I think I feel cold. “What did you just say?”
“The guy who makes those…” I don’t hear whatever else he says.
“Are we clear?” I ask, and Kilo confirms.
“Good.” Taking the comm back from Riann, I tell him, “When we get up there, you are getting us back to the Zone as fast as possible. I don’t care what it takes.”
“What about who sent that guy after us?” Kilo asks.
“This is more important.”
Riann nods. “We’ll be out of here before anyone has the chance to ask why we’re leaving.”
An unreasonable dread settles deep in my gut.
SHOCK
Risk is patched up, Chrys and Kissu are curled up together in the cat tree, and I brush the snow off my legs as I come back upstairs.
“Where did you put them?” Risk glances at Chrys.
She needs the sleep, so neither of us even consider bothering her.
“About twenty centeks west.” Far enough away there’s no chance of damage, close enough I could move them without a helmet so no sensors mark my ID.
Risk nods and doesn’t ask any other questions.
The Maker is watching us, or listening… Risk isn’t clear on exactly how the Maker knew he’d be at the wreck, or what he’d be looking for, but the less we say, the better.
Risk winces at every movement. It’s been so long since he’s been injured, he’s not used to the ways the pain sneaks up on him.
A helicopter buzzes past the window, headed for the crash site and Chrys stirs, but it’s the tone of the incoming call that wakes her. She yawns as Kissu flops his massive head against her shoulder, but she doesn’t get up, just watches from where they’re tucked away, lids heavy.
Drift’s irritation seeps through the screen when I answer.
This could have been a written message, except… “Emergency meeting, be here within the hour.”
“Another one?” I ask, instead of telling him we’re on our way.
“Yeah.” He looks at Risk’s mesh and says, “And no, it’s not about your unsanctioned trip to the crash site.”
“What is it about?”
“Arc and Kilo found something in Calisan. That’s all I can say right now.”
“He didn’t call us.” Chrys slides out of her perch and joins us.
“He can’t. An explosion wiped out their communication equipment and relays. They had to route the information to us through a CSS satellite patch.”
“Are they okay?”
“As far as I know, yes. They were adamant that everyone needs to be here. I don’t know why, but your outpost isn’t safe.”
I nod. “Understood.”
When the call disconnects, I look down at Chrys. “I need to shower.”
“Now?” Her brows quirk, but she doesn’t try to fight me as I take her hand and drag her along behind me.
She laughs as I spin her out of her clothes and wraps her arms around my neck as I pull her into the shower, the water beating down on us.
“I’m not going, am I?” She kisses me instead of letting me answer, and I have time to enjoy it, so I do.
But eventually, I have to pull back. “The two of you have to stay. We have to go.”
She nods. “He’s going to be so mad at you.”
“I know. This meeting is going to be the worst one yet.”
CHRYS
The urge to tell them to stay is staggering.
Risk lifts me off the ground to twirl me around. “I love you, koah. You’re going to be okay.”
He kisses me and I want, so badly, to drag them back into our bedroom, to block out the rest of the world one more time and wait for Arc to come back to us. But we can’t.
“I love you, too.”
When he puts me back on my feet, he nudges me toward Shock and hands Kissu my frankenbunny bag.
He prances away with it like it’s prey he caught, but I don’t question it. I’m not going to question anything they do right now.
Shock glares out the window, mouth twisted in a scowl I don’t like.
Helicopters circle the wreckage like vultures, and the cleanup crews shuffle over it like swarming insects. It makes my skin crawl.
“It’s probably the worst time to have this meeting,” he says with an irritated sigh.
“Probably… but you’ve got to go.”
“I do.”
He wraps his arms around my shoulders, holding me close, lips to my ear as we both stare out the window. “We love you. We wouldn’t leave you if we weren’t certain you’ll be okay.”
“I know, and I love you too.” I turn and kiss his cheek. “Tell Arc I love him, when you see him.”
“Before or after he tries to kill me.”
“Both.”
“We won’t stay any longer than we have to.”
“Good, I want you back as soon as I can have you.”
They both look down at me and I know they feel my nerves through the bond.
Shock takes my hand, and I flinch at the brief image that flashes in my mind.
“I think I’d prefer prophetic dreams, after all.”
He winces as he lets me go. “Sorry.”
“I’m not.” If this is the price of having them, I’ll take it.
We have to let this happen.
“Stay warm.” He looks at Kissu who’s back and sitting beside us with his twitching tail wrapped around his paws. “You know what to do.”
He kisses me, hands squeezing my arms like he’d rather hug me, and then Risk takes his place. When he kisses me, his hand briefly rests on my stomach, fingers spreading wide, and then he hurries out the door, leaving me with anxious prickles racing over my skin.
Kissu stands immediately and moves behind me, nudging me with his head.
“Is this what you’re supposed to do?”
He doesn’t answer me, of course, just steers me deeper into the outpost. “You don’t have to push, I’ll follow.”
The lower levels are a maze of freezing cold rooms, but I don’t have the opportunity to get lost. Kissu makes sure of that.
He leads me directly into the room full of medical equipment that I am far too familiar with.
Oh, Risk’s hand…
I’m providing the bait.
Kissu pushes me toward a stall-like compartment, steering me to the screen beside it.
I might not be able to speak Sianese yet, but I can read a lot of it… the circular letters have always felt more like pictographic code, but more than that, I know what sequence I need to push to switch it to English.
It’s an eerie feeling.
The machine is already primed for me. I was the last one in it, after all.
That thought turns my stomach, but I step into the same space I stood.
Kissu sits outside, purring.
Swirling lights, cool puffs of air, and a gentle hum tell me it’s working.
Kissu paws at the floor when it’s done.
Come, wiffan. It’s a whisper, but I’m certain it’s real.
He clamps his mouth loosely around my wrist and pulls me back to the screen.
It’s a bright array of dancing lights and I wait as they flutter across the screen, words and numbers populating in a cascade.
A dozen different bits of information fill out like character stats. Normal numbers are black. Things that need addressing are bold and blue.
It shows me the medical reason for the tightness in my thigh—it doesn’t tell me the source, but I remember forgetting to stretch last night—and the light swelling in my wrist, an old injury acting up because of the cold.
It spits out a pair of pills the screen identifies as “safe painkillers.”
The line that populates next isn’t just bold, it’s about ten points larger.
“And there it is…” I say under my breath. Bait.
I thought I’d feel it if—when—I got pregnant.
The machine offers me a more comprehensive scan, but I decline it.
Whatever else there is to know, I’d prefer we all learn it at the same time.
“What do you think?” I ask. “Are you going to be an uncle?”
Kissu sneezes and I know it’s an emphatic “no.”
“We’ll figure that out later.” I scratch his chin. “Take me back upstairs, please.”
Kissu leads me back out so I don’t have to guess. I’ll figure out the layout later.
When I sit on the couch, he brings me another pair of socks and then my boots.
I put them on, wondering how long it’s going to take.
I dig in the blankets for my e-reader, but it’s gone. Eyes narrowed, I look at Kissu and he, very suspiciously, doesn’t look back at me.
Going to my cat tree, I climb up one step and peek in the basket bed.
It’s not there either.
I can’t think of any reason he would have hidden it from me.
And then, I don’t have to think of a reason.
A chime echoes through the outpost. I’ve only heard it twice before, when Kimba and Hazard came by.
The doorbell.
Quicker than I thought it would be. Maybe he doesn’t think he has time to waste.
Kissu hops down from the sofa and slinks into the back hall.
If he doesn’t want to be seen, I won’t give him away.
I walk to the door slowly and take my time putting my jacket on, checking my pocket to make sure I have gloves tucked away inside. I don’t answer until it chimes again.
A leached gray Sian with sharp green eyes, I don’t know why I’m surprised that he looks older than most of the men I’ve seen. He looks at me like we know each other.
“Hello Chrys.” He greets me like an old friend.
“Can I help you?”
There’s a vehicle in the snow behind him. It looks like the helicopters flying around the crash site, but without blades.
“You already have.” He holds out his hand. “Now come with me.”
I look at his hand instead of taking it. “No thank you.”
Sighing heavily, he moves his other hand into view. I look at the gun because he wants me to.
“Come with me, or I will go deal with that troublesome zurgle for the inconvenience he’s caused and drag you out screaming.” He glances toward the helicopter, revealing burn scars beneath his collar.
“Who are you?” I ask, even though I know.
“I’m the one who made them.”
“You’re supposed to be dead.” I step out and close the door behind me.
His smile when he turns back sends a shiver of cold dread down my spine.
“That’s exactly what they were supposed to think.”