by Kelly Jensen
Taking the elder’s advice, Dillon sipped the cloudy water. It tasted like semen. With a wry smile, he lifted the glass in Vagnan’s direction. “Bottom’s up.”
By the end of the day, Vagnan had answered close to three hundred questions, none of them the most pressing. Dillon still didn’t know where he was or how Lang was, or how long any of this was going to take. The information he had accumulated, however, was unsettling.
He could now sense emotion without touching someone. Simply being in close proximity to another person would do the trick. Thankfully, this skill seemed limited to clan as there were no other humans around to test him on.
He could read loose thoughts. With training, he might be able to pry free not so loose thoughts.
“No thank you. I don’t need to know what’s going on in anyone else’s head. I’ve got enough thoughts of my own to contend with.”
Across the table, Vagnan gave Dillon one of his galaxy-weary smiles. “Based on that skill alone, you could become a very valuable member of the clan community. Thought sense is highly prized.”
Dillon’s most evident talent was called touch sense. Proximity sense was knowing where people were—the talent Elder Arayu had exhibited most clearly over the summer when she’d assisted Dillon and Lang with the Nay problem. Arayu had trained her talent to the point where she could also discern states of being, from death through sleep to wakefulness. It was an unusual talent and also highly prized.
“Not all Wren are talented,” Vagnan had explained at some point. “Some are merely Sensitive, meaning they have potential. They may catch a glimpse here and there. Many of our clan have no talent whatsoever. You and I are a part of the top five percent.”
Which explained why they were so interested in Dillon.
“Did Roth have a talent?” Dillon asked, shifting his buttocks again. They’d been sitting forever. Dillon let his gaze roam a little, though he’d already cataloged every inch of the room. Would Lang have called it a convergence room, or would he have been on Earth long enough for the name to sound ridiculous? Maybe it was a rough translation from Wren to English and not entirely correct.
Vagnan was giving him the sort of scrutiny you saved for weird-smelling shit on the bottom of your shoe.
“What?” Dillon arched his eyebrows. “Did my father have a talent or not?”
“Your father had extremely developed thought sense. He could read thoughts without having to touch his subject. This made him invaluable when it came to work in his particular field.”
“Huh.”
Roth had had a way of gazing at people intently, but Dillon had always taken it as Roth’s way of paying attention. As a kid, he’d enjoyed it. Roth always made him feel as though what he had to say was worthwhile. Now, knowing his father had probably been reading his thoughts made him more than a little uncomfortable. Dillon had been picturing boys naked by the age of thirteen. What he wanted to do with a naked boy at fourteen. His fantasies had become startlingly mature at fifteen—shortly after his first fumble with half-naked boy in his neighborhood. Roth had disappeared shortly after then, so…
Squirming in his seat, Dillon put aside reminiscence. “So what’s your talent? What makes you valuable to the Wren?” It came to him as soon as he’d finished asking the question. “You’re the same as me, aren’t you? Touch sense.”
Vagnan answered with a brief nod.
“You’re the best in your class,” Dillon continued. “You know how I’m feeling right now. You know I’m embarrassed because I’ve just realized my father probably knew all along that I was gay and was probably perving on my fantasies.”
Vagnan cleared his throat. “It is not polite to eavesdrop without express permission or a warrant.”
“A warrant?”
“A writ allowing the talented to use their skill in certain situations. Many professions come with a…” Vagnan paused as though searching for the right word. “Wide effect? The right to use a talent as deemed necessary.”
“Have you got one of those?”
“Yes, I do. But the only time I have deemed it necessary to use my talent has been when we are in direct contact for the purposes of establishing your level of skill.”
Leaning back in his chair, Dillon rubbed his eyes. He didn’t know whether he believed Vagnan or not but was inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt. Dillon had remained fairly open throughout the session, hoping his cooperation would lead to the answers he did want.
“Are you fatigued?” Vagnan asked.
“A little. If you’ve got some coffee, we can press on with whatever. When does this training start? How long is all of this going to take?” He should just record himself and press the Play button periodically.
“We have already started and have done as much as we can today.”
“All I did was touch everyone you brought in here and tell you what color their feelings were. I could have done that on Earth.”
Vagnan’s expression did not alter. The guy was probably incapable of true emotion. But something about him changed, so subtly, Dillon almost believed he was only catching it through his newfound extended senses—which pissed him off.
“Except you think I’m dangerous,” Dillon continued, despite wanting to swallow the words. But his stomach was all hollowed out, and the weight of everything that had happened threatened to buckle his spine. He scrubbed his palms over his eyes again before pressing the meatiest part of his hand inward. A soft pain flared over the front of his face as he continued to apply pressure to his eyes, and behind his closed lids, colors whirled and danced. Tempting as it was to either do himself proper harm, or let his thoughts go into the circling flashes of light and dark, Dillon fought his way back to the surface and dropped his hands. “I need to know if Lang is okay. I’m not going to help you anymore until I know.”
“It is I who am helping you.”
“I don’t fucking care.”
“You should. Without this training, you could kill someone or worse.”
The metaphorical weight over his spine increased, and Dillon let it crush him, his forehead meeting the table with a sickening thunk. “Can’t we just burn whatever this is out of me? That’s how they do it in the books, right?” he mumbled into the stupidly smooth glass. “Let’s turn the off switch. I don’t need this shit.”
When he took a peek, Vagnan looked vaguely constipated. Rather than congratulate himself on actually managing to shift the elder’s expression, Dillon pushed back from the table and stood.
“I want to go lie down.” At the door, he remembered the room he’d come from had only been equipped with a bunch of stasis capsules. The niggle he’d tucked away earlier waved like a drowning man from the corner of his thoughts. Ignoring it, he asked, “I don’t have to get back into a pod thingy, do I?”
Vagnan met Dillon at the door. “These are your quarters. Speak any request to Ecero and the furniture will be rearranged accordingly.”
“Really?”
The elder allowed a lip twitch. “Really. We’ll reconvene in approximately ten of your hours.”
Glancing at the blank face of the monitor strapped to his wrist, Dillon made the only answer he could. “See you then.”
Vagnan left, and Dillon surveyed his room again. Then, instead of giving any instructions, he tucked himself into the far corner, sitting on the floor with his knees drawn up, his chin balanced between. He was tired in a way that guaranteed he could sleep on top of a chainsaw, but was loath to close his eyes. He couldn’t recall dreaming in stasis, but knew what awaited him now. Lang’s face, slack with unconsciousness, the trickle of blood leaking from his nostrils, the translucent quality of his already pale skin, and the now undeniable fact that Dillon had almost killed him. That without this training, he could kill him. Or worse.
What could be worse?
With a fierce lurch, he shifted his thoughts to his mother—and immediately pictured her slumped over in her brightly colored kitchen. He might have done nothing but h
ug her.
“Oh God.” Tucking his face into the dark space between his knees and his chest, Dillon swallowed against the burn in his throat and tried once more not to cry.
Chapter Fourteen
Dillon is healthy and performing well in training.
If the message had been printed on a sheet of paper, Lang might have turned it over to check the back for more information. Nearly two weeks after Dillon’s “recruitment,” however, he knew this was all he was going to get. One line, delivered to his AI, every second day. He hadn’t yet given up asking Upero to examine the signal for extra code or location data, even though the transmission bursts appeared to be as sanitary as they were solitary. For all Lang knew, the same signal was being retransmitted every time.
His return messages were longer, and he had no faith they were being transmitted in full. Likely as not, Dillon was receiving something along the lines of: Lang is healthy and performing well in your absence. No, that would be too much information. Lang is healthy would be all Dillon would need to know. A half smile pulled at one side of Lang’s mouth as he thought about all Dillon would want to know. Was he raising dust everywhere he went? Demanding answers to questions the elders hadn’t thought of yet?
Stars, I hope so.
“Upero, have you made any progress in figuring out where the message signal is coming from?”
“I have not. I have determined that the signal intercepts a METOP satellite as it passes over the southern polar region, but have not been able to trace it after that.”
“The southern polar region? Is that unusual?”
“No. Antarctic research stations regularly upload large amounts of data. It would be a simple matter to bury a clan signal in there.”
“Where do you think they’re keeping Dillon?” Lang had given this question a lot of thought over the past few days. He’d tried to think about it before Dillon left, but hadn’t been able to process much data through the fog of imminent loss. Holding on to Dillon had been much more important—even when the holding seemed to make them both miserable.
After the Apocalyptic Lang incident, Elders Vagnan and Obele had shown up awfully fast with the new module for Upero, but they hadn’t been here for Lang. So the real question was: When had they suspected Dillon might exhibit Wren talents?
“How long would it take us to travel to Jord?” Lang asked instead.
“Depending on our launch window, with the upgraded systems we have implemented, approximately three to six months.”
“So how was Arayu able to get here so fast last year?”
“The Wren possess superior technology, but—”
“It would make no sense for them to keep a significant advance in interstellar travel from the rest of the clan. Weaponry, maybe, but not speed. Unless I’m being terribly naïve?”
“I do not think so. The Wren deploy members of other clans in service positions. Such a secret could not be kept.”
“So, the Jord have a facility closer to Earth, maybe in this solar system.”
“That would be my conclusion.”
“Do you think that’s where they took Dillon?”
“It is possible.”
Optimism swelled behind his breastbone. “Let’s start combing for anything unusual in all public and privately funded astronomical data on the outer reaches of the solar system. I want to know if a kid in Hawaii thinks there’s an alien presence on the other side of Jupiter. All out-there theories and all confirmed anomalies.”
“Are you thinking of taking a vacation, Steilang?”
“Are you going to advise me otherwise?”
Lang nearly jumped out of his chair when his smartwatch buzzed.
Heart knocking against his chest hard enough to leave a bruise, Lang tapped his wrist. “Yes? I mean, hello. Ah… Steilang speaking.” He squinted at the display, his weary gaze blurring and clearing too rapidly for him to make out the identity of his caller.
“Lang, is that you?”
At the sound of Josh’s voice, Lang’s heart knocked a little louder before almost stalling out entirely. “Josh,” he croaked rather than said.
“Oh my God. Oh… Damn it. Oh, Lang. Is Dillon okay?”
“What do you mean?”
“You sound awful. Did his mom, ah… We haven’t heard from either of you in days. Um…”
“His mother? No, it was his grandmother.” The smartwatch screen started blinking. “Can you hold on, Josh? I think I have another call.” Lang pressed the mute button and spoke to Upero. “What is it?”
“The texts I sent on Dillon’s behalf indicated that his mother had fallen ill.”
“Oh.” Hadn’t there been a conversation about Dillon’s grandmother? “I, hmm…” Lang unmuted the call. “Back. Listen, Dillon has to go to Korea. His grandmother wants to return to where she was born, and he has said he will take her.”
“I understand.”
He did? “He is quite… distraught.”
“I can only imagine,” Josh’s tone was soothing. “I know how close he is to his family. Tell him to take all the time he needs. Park Arts isn’t going anywhere, and neither are we.”
“Thank you. Ah, thank you. I’ll tell him.”
“Okay. You take care, and if you guys need anything, give me a call!”
Josh hung up before Lang could continue saying thank you in lieu of I don’t know where Dillon is, but, yeah, I’ll pass the message on. Eventually.
He’d be able to pass the message on one day, wouldn’t he?
“Steilang?
“Hmm?”
“You set a reminder regarding the reports June sent over yesterday. She is expecting a reply in approximately eighty-nine minutes.”
Lang turned his glazed eyes back to the laptop and accessed his email folder. Twenty minutes later, he’d scanned every page of an acquisition committee assessment for a pharmaceutical plant in Pennsylvania and could remember none of it… and none of it seemed to matter.
Had it ever?
Opening a new email, he typed a message to June directing her to pass on the deal.
“You do not want to purchase NuChem?” Upero asked.
“Nope.”
In the beat of silence after the negative, Lang imagined both he and Upero were musing over “nope” being a very Dillon-esque word.
“May I ask why you changed your mind? You were very interested in this purchase a month ago.”
Lang leaned back in his chair and let out a sigh. “I don’t remember reading the report, Upero. But I knew what it said. That is my talent. Aside from knowing how to gauge land value and weather patterns, and turn certain industries toward the production of goods and services that will benefit my people.”
Upero’s silence following these statements had a very different feel.
This time, Lang spoke into the pause. “I don’t know what it’s all for. I do, but I don’t. All I do is for the Skov. For the clan. So, it’s for me—but it’s not. And… I don’t want any of it.” Not anymore.
He’d had too much time to think over the past two weeks, and while most of his thoughts had been directed toward where the Wren might have taken Dillon—and how long it would take him to get there—the rest had centered loosely on the idea that he no longer felt any urgency toward his mission.
When he’d found out the Skov might not be earthbound at all, Lang had faced the possibility he might have waited twenty-five years for no purpose and could spend the rest of his life charting the same course to nowhere. With Dillon gone, he felt more rudderless. Beneath the grief, dwelling deep within the vast and aimless ocean his life had become, lurked a tentacled beast named anger. Skov were not supposed to feel anger. It was not a productive emotion.
Neither is love.
And yet.
“Being on Earth has changed me, Upero.”
“It would be surprising if the experience had not altered you in some way.”
“I mean mentally.” Lang straightened his spine. “Emotionally.”
/>
“I concur.”
He gripped the arms of the chair. “I believe it is time for me to act upon these changes.”
“I await your instructions.”
Tipping his head back, Lang smiled toward the ceiling. There were times when Upero’s imitation or approximation of empathy and emotion bothered him. The AI’s immediate response to his latest conundrum only confirmed his suspicions, though. Upero was definitely evolving. They both were.
“We have come a long way, you and I,” he said.
“And we have farther to go.”
They did. If Lang was to live out his days on Earth, his mission reduced to a footnote in the annals of clan history, then it was up to him to make his existence count for something. To make his life worthwhile—if not to his people, then to himself.
His wrist buzzed again, and Lang glanced down at the display, frowning when he saw who was calling. Hana Lee.
Dillon’s mother thought they were both sick with the flu and called every day. Lang wasn’t sure what he was going to tell her next week, when they both should be recovered. Or the week after that. Or when she wanted to visit them, or have them out to lunch again.
The constant fear that she might try to call the school or speak to Josh only added to the ball of other emotions he hadn’t quite yet defined. Drawing in another deep breath, Lang accepted the call and managed a cough as he said, “Hello, Hana.”
“You’re still coughing?” In the background, Lang heard the bustle of the hospital where Hana worked. Overhead announcements, the low murmur of many voices, and, closer, the clack of a keyboard.
Lang cleared his throat. “Not so much.”
“Why is Dillon not answering his phone? Always he answers with a text. I want to talk to him.”
Lang glanced at the phone balanced at the edge of his desk—Dillon’s phone—and cringed inwardly. He’d hated using it to text people, but what else was he supposed to do? Call Wesley Kohen and tell the world that aliens had abducted his boyfriend?
He’d save that as a last resort.
“He’s sleeping right now. Can I get him to call you later?”