Everyone gushed in agreement, hope once again filling the lift, its weight pressing Kjersi farther into the corner. “Fools,” she muttered under her breath. “All of you.”
Finally, the lift reached their floor. She held back waiting for everyone to spill out of the mine, into the steel-lined barracks where they would meet for a meal. Nabil was the only one who turned back, frowning at her as she stopped next to the lift driver.
“If there is no contest, my people will crucify you.”
He raised his hands in protest, shaking his head as he replied, “Whoa, whoa. But there is. I promise you, girl. There is a contest. It’s the president himself who thirsts for a second Painite. It is said the gem haunts his dreams and his greed is as big as his gut. And the one who brings him the largest one will be freed of the mines forever.”
With that, the lift driver pushed her out of the lift, slammed the door, and disappeared in his ascension.
“See?” Nabil said over her shoulder. “Not everything is a lie. Now let’s go see if they have any pie.”
Kjersi grunted as they made their way to the dining hall.
♛
“I’m going to win that contest,” a nearby miner named Ronan said, slamming his pint of ale on the steel table. “If it’s the last thing I do, I will leave this dirty planet.”
“The only thing dirtier than this planet is your undergarments,” Nabil teased. Roars of laughter filled the dining hall from all around her, but Kjersi did not smile. Instead, she watched Ronan’s face flush red, and then in a flurry of arms and legs he threw his drink to the floor and jumped over the table at Nabil.
Ronan was a fool. He’d always been one. Their fathers had worked side by side in the mines until they’d both died from the dust. Kjersi had grown up with Ronan always watching her with eyes that wanted more than friendship, the pressure pushing her away from him. She would not ruin her life with love like her mother had. Love brought hope.
It wasn’t until the commotion knocked her own drink from her hand that she stood up and yelled, “Enough!” The boys paused a moment, revealing a trickle of blood from Nabil’s nose and Ronan’s partially swelled eye. She stood, letting her chair grind against the already worn floor. “They hang a promise of Earth in front of your noses and you turn into barbarians. Idiots! All of you.”
And with that, Kjersi retreated to her quarters.
♛
“Tell me about Earth,” Kjersi’s older sister, Jaala, said from the bed that had become her home for the last month since her cough had taken a turn for the worse.
“What can I say?” Kjersi replied. “It was before my time. Long before our parents or their parents before them.”
Jaala twisted a brittle strand of hair around her finger. “What about the stories that Father used to tell? The ones about the air that was so clean, you could breathe it without a mask. The ones about the water so fresh, it had life that lived in its depths. The ones about a sun that gave life to the planet and didn’t take it away.”
Kjersi grunted. “Stories. That’s all they are. Why is everyone suddenly so taken with Earth? It’s an old world that never progressed past war. We forget why our people left that galaxy. We should just be grateful for our colonies, light years away from Earth.”
Jaala let go of her hair and pointed at her sister. “You’re wrong. Stories bring hope. Without Earth, I have no hope. I’ll die in this tiny room, never to feel the sun on my skin.” Her voice cracked at the end as her body broke out into a fit of coughs. Pain twisted her features as she curled her body into itself under her blanket.
“Shhh, now,” Kjersi said. “Look what hope does to you. Makes you too excited. Let me be the one to worry about Earth.” She sat at her sister’s side, rubbing her back. In such a short time the tables had turned; Jaala had gone from the surrogate mother who cared for her to the one needing care.
Once Jaala’s breathing calmed to the rhythms of sleep, Kjersi left her sister’s bedside. Kneeling on her own bed, she reached around the far side of the mattress, butted against the cold steel walls, until her hand grazed against the top of a tiny cloth bag made from the rags of her father’s old mask.
“Keep this safe,” he’d told her long ago, when the cough had racked his body until it was so frail, he couldn’t push himself out of bed. “This is the rarest gem of the mines. This is Painite. Keep it hidden until the day you need to use it.”
Kjersi remembered the day her father had found the first chunk of Painite. She was just a child. The president was so excited he’d brought her family to the surface for a celebration that night. A buffet was spread out in his office, revealing enough food to feed the entire mine, yet there were only four of them there. It was then that she realized the division between the surface and the underground.
She pulled the bag out from under her bed, emptying its contents into her palm. Veins of rust-colored mineral contrasted against the sheen of the black crystal. The gem was no larger than her thumb, yet she'd known its value the moment it had passed from her father’s hand into her own. He’d kept it hidden all of these years, and she never understood how such a tiny thing could carry power.
Hope was a dangerous thing in these parts. She’d learned long ago not to trust the pangs of hope that could seep into one’s skin. The promise of Earth wasn’t enough for her to give up the gem.
♛
Every day for the next week was the same. Kjersi woke. She worked. Then she stood in line, shuffling forward. Forty-six… forty-seven… forty-eight. She lifted her mask and washed her face with the grimy rag. She took her place in line at the lift, where Nabil always saved her a spot, staring ahead while he complained about Ronan or something new that had rattled his cage. Then they climbed into the lift and ascended to the dining hall.
But not today. Today was different.
That morning Jaala had coughed up blood. Kjersi knew that meant her sickness had progressed, like it had with their father. Without Jaala, what would be the point of living? She hated herself for letting despair take over and bringing with it a tiny shard of hope. She’d pulled the gem from its hiding spot and spun it between her fingers. Maybe it was okay to have hope. Maybe she should see just how far the Painite could take Jaala.
Now, inside the lift, she reached her hand into her pocket, gripping the small shard of hope—her father’s Painite. Once everyone left, bustling about hungrily for the dining hall, she turned to the lift driver. “I need to see the president.”
The lift driver’s mouth dropped open before the corners curled into a smile. “No one just goes and sees the president. Especially not girls like you.”
“Trust me,” she said, pulling the Painite from her pocket and displaying it between her thumb and forefinger. “He’ll want to see this.”
The lift driver’s mouth dropped open as he reached toward the dark gem.
“Uh-uh.” She shook her head, sticking the shard of Painite back in her pocket. “Now, take me to the president.”
She could feel the lift driver’s gaze on her the entire ride, but she refused to meet it. She had to stay focused—on task—alert. The president wasn’t known for being charitable. But for Jaala, she needed to convince him.
“Put on your goggles,” the lift driver said, pulling his over his eyes. “Or you’ll regret it.”
She scrambled to pull her goggles down from her tangled locks, then braced herself against the back of the lift as it slowed and broke the surface. Rings of blinding light assaulted her eyes through her goggles.
“What is that?” she cried out.
“What?” The lift driver laughed. “The sun? Haven’t you ever been to the surface before?”
“Just once.” Cringing against the side of the lift, Kjersi pressed her eyelids closed as her palm gripped the Painite in her pocket. “But the sun had set.”
When the lift finally stopped, she pried her fingers off the gem. “Last door at the end of the hall,” the lift driver said, motioning.
; She stepped out of the lift, turning back for guidance, but the lift driver had already sped away. Taking a deep breath, she moved toward the large doors at the end of the hall. When she arrived, they swished open, announcing her arrival.
A large white room revealed itself, lined with pale chairs and a desk at the end of the room. She carefully walked inside, quick to note the mine dusk that covered her body was leaving a trail across the plush white carpet. Soft music played from the ceiling, the only other sound from a woman at the desk as she clicked on a screen.
“Hello, 980816,” the woman said without looking up from her screen. “Have a seat, please. The president will see you soon.”
“But how did you know my birthcode?” Kjersi asked.
The secretary sighed and met Kjersi’s gaze with a less-than-impressed glance. “It’s not your birthcode. It’s your name.” Then she motioned with her hands. “And it’s the room; it’s filled with sensors. Now have a seat, please.” She turned back to her screen and started clicking again.
She looked around the empty room and took the closest seat on the right to the desk. There she pulled off her goggles, remembering her birthcode. The gear was filthy from years of use, but after rubbing around the nose piece she found the faint etching of numbers inside the plastic. The undergrounders refused to be named by the date they were born. In the mines the birthcodes were nothing more than identifiers of whose gear belonged to whom. Giving children a real name at birth was a way to claim the mines as their own.
“He’ll see you now,” the secretary said as the wall behind her separated.
Kjersi slowly stood, fidgeting with the goggles in her hands. Nerves were throwing her off her game. She missed the mines. The darkness.
Inside the president’s office, the walls were steel, reminding her of back home. She couldn’t help but stare at their familiar cool surface as she approached the president’s desk.
“Nice, aren’t they?” he said from his chair.
She nodded, mumbling a “yes, sir” as she took the seat in front of him.
“I had the room renovated the moment I stepped into office. I’ve nothing against the sun, of course, not like some undergrounders,” he said, looking down his long nose at her.
“I’ve never seen the sun until today,” she said.
He burst into laughter, his round face stretched to its limit as he tilted back his head to allow the sound to escape his throat. She noticed the extra folds of weight under his chin, a sign of the privilege of excess that the surface provided. Kjersi shifted in her seat, aware of how her bones and muscle showed through her thin layer of skin, shadowed by the dust.
“You haven’t truly seen the sun,” he said, wiping tears from his eyes once his laughter subsided. “Not until you’ve flown in its orbit. Of course, it’s surrounded by complete and utter darkness, but that doesn’t diminish its fortitude. Only then you can truly get a sense of its wonder and greatness. A power that both giveth and taketh away.”
She nodded, wishing she’d never come. But Jaala, yes, she couldn’t forget about Jaala. “I’ve got something for you,” she said, standing and pulling the Painite from her pocket. She tossed the chunk of gem onto the desk between them, where it skidded across the surface, landing in front of the president.
Immediately, his eyes widened as he scooped the Painite up with his hands. She noticed then that he wore gloves, white ones, and the dust of the mines left its trace against the pale fabric as he rolled the Painite over again and again in his palm.
“Why, it’s beautiful,” he cried out. “Just beautiful.”
She waited for him to mention the competition as he swirled the gem in a glass of water. Flecks of dust soon darkened the clear liquid. Slowly lifting the gem from the glass, the president wrapped it in a silky white handkerchief, frowning as a drop of grayed water fell to his pristine white desk.
“It’s very rare, you know,” he said, wiping up the drop with the handkerchief before setting it down. “Even back on Earth, only a few were ever found.” He began to unwrap the soft folds of white silk. “To think my luck would bring me here, to this desolate place, only for me to find the rarest gem across the six galaxies.”
Kjersi looked at the open handkerchief, revealing the Painite. Its edges shone in their rust-colored glory, embedded in the gem like dried blood. But even more striking was its core, visible through the sheen of its surface, dark as the mines it was born in. She cleared her throat. “About the contest, sir. I’d like to enter my sister’s name in place of mine.”
“The contest, yes,” he said, still playing with the gem. “Wait—what?”
“The contest,” Kjersi repeated. “The one where you get entered for a ticket back to Earth in exchange for the Painite.”
“Yes, yes,” he said, his voice getting louder and faster as his face reddened. “Of course I know my own contest, you stupid girl. But what’s this about your sister?”
Kjersi shrank in her chair, wishing she were anywhere but here. “I want to submit her name in place of mine.”
“Why would you do such a stupid thing as that? I mean, it’s Earth.”
“It’s just that she’s—”
“I don’t care what she is!”
“I didn’t mean any offense—”
“What, are things too cushy in the mines that you’d prefer to stay there than go to Earth?” The president banged a fist on his desk, making the glass jar of water with the Painite in it shake. “Unheard of, is what it is, 980816! No, you cannot enter your sister’s name in place of your own. If she wants to go, she can bring her own gem. Now go, get out of here before I decide to strike your name from the list as well.”
♛
“What’s eating you?” Nabil asked as they waited in line the next day.
Kjersi didn’t answer. How could she tell her oldest friend that she’d been hiding Painite since her father had died, the one thing that could get them off this god forsaken planet? How could she tell him that the only way she’d survived all these years was burying that hope, and now she’d let a little bit out and it had all blown up in her face?
“Fine,” Nabil said. “Ignore me. But that just means I’ll harass you all through supper until you spill.”
Their turn for the lift arrived, and Kjersi hid herself from the driver. But he paid her no mind, instead talking about the lucky entrant from the day before.
“What did they look like?” someone asked.
“Ah, you all look the same to me,” the lift driver said. Kjersi grunted from her corner. “But the president said the entrant was a true undergrounder, worthy of a ride to Earth.” Kjersi snorted, but the lift driver ignored her. “In fact, he said he can’t wait to meet the next one of you to bring him more Painite.”
Inside the cafeteria people were grumbling throughout the lineup. Kjersi ignored it, wishing it would move quickly so she could get home to check on Jaala. The line ahead of her pushed back when two men started arguing.
Ronan’s voice rose above the line. “I heard it was another 98er—980816? Which one of you is that?”
She froze at the mention of her birthcode but avoided eye contact with Ronan and shimmied closer to Nabil.
“Show me your goggles,” Ronan said, grabbing at one of his friends’ headwear. The two wrestled, falling out of line and bumping into the wall. Ronan managed to pull off the man’s headgear and looked at the code. Standing, he chucked the goggles back at the man, who still sat on the floor. “That’s one down, who’s next?” Ronan jumped back in line and started harassing another one of his friends.
Nabil groaned. “I hate that guy. If he finds a Painite before me, I’ll lose my shit.”
She shuddered at the thought of the Painite she’d kept hidden all these years. Her father had been sure it would bring them a better life, but he’d died before he could do anything with it. “Let it go,” Kjersi said. “He’s not worth it. And he’s not finding any Painite.”
“Well, someone did,” Nabil said.
“It might be easier than you think.”
“Why, Nabil? Why is it so important to you to leave?”
“Imagine the adventure, getting out of the mines, off of Leo 6.” A dreamy look crossed Nabil’s dirty face. “Really, the universe is a version of the mines—dark and mysterious, with planets hidden in its expanse, as precious as gems like Painite.”
“You make it sound so appealing,” she said. “But there’s only room for one person. I could never leave Jaala.”
“Never say never.” Sadness weighed down Nabil’s voice.
Kjersi stared straight ahead, watching as Ronan harassed a third friend without luck. She made a mental note to hide her goggles where he’d never find them.
♛
After supper Kjersi sat at the edge of her bed, listening to Jaala’s shallow breathing. That morning her sister had developed a fever. She was stable, but Kjersi didn’t like it. Jaala wouldn’t make it another month in the mines.
Kjersi stood, pacing the room as she pulled her goggles from her head. Spinning them between her hands, she tried to focus on a solution. The president wouldn’t let her submit Jaala’s name in place of her own, and searching for another chunk of Painite was pointless. Why did he have to make things so difficult?
She tossed her goggles on her bed, frustrated that she had hit a wall. Her only option was to send someone else to pretend to be Jaala. But no one in their right mind would do that for them, not even Nabil. Earth was too great a prize. Plus, there was that damn sensor in the office. They’d know right away it wasn’t Jaala. Kjersi grabbed her goggles, moving them to the floor with her other mining gear, but she paused a moment when she noticed the birthcode she’d revealed yesterday. That was it. She didn’t have to send someone to pretend to be Jaala when she had all she needed right here to do it herself.
She retreated to the foot of her sister’s bed and reached for the wooden chest that had sat closed since Jaala became bedridden. The hinges fought against Kjersi as she opened the lid, revealing her sister’s old mining gear. From here on out she was going to be 930410.
Magic at Midnight Page 33