The Silver Ship and the Sea

by Brenda Cooper

  We held two beasts each, and Liam was reaching for Legs’s head harness, when the wide door the shuttles used creaked and rolled up, and the lights in the building clicked on, stopping all of us momentarily, human and hebra. Legs darted around Liam and started running for the door. I struggled with Stripes and Star as they nearly pulled me from my feet, trying to follow. Akashi stepped toward Legs, his arms windmilling, trying to slow the big beast, but Legs darted left and around, and fled out the big hangar door just before the skimmer’s lights shone directly on us, coming inside. The noise shook the floor and the walls, and I was too busy with Stripes and Star to look, pulling them out of the path, as far away from the skimmer as I could, trying like hell not to share my fear with them, to stay calm, to calm them.

  Then, silence. The big door closed. The hebras quieted.

  The skimmer shimmered: the same bright silver of New Making. A flattened cylinder with two raked-back stubby wings, sitting on five wheels, only a quarter the size of the shuttles, and new and sleek in contrast to the bigger, older shuttles.

  Someone flicked its lights off.

  What if it wasn’t Jenna and Joseph and Alicia? What if Hunter had kept it hidden with the other altered artifacts he’d confiscated?

  A door on the top popped open in two parts, rising like tiny square wings, and Joseph stood up, screaming. “We did it! We flew!”

  I unclipped the leads, left them lying there, and ran toward Joseph, reaching him just as he finished climbing down, clutching him to me. “Wow!” With such a machine, we could…we could travel anywhere, we could explore, maybe even get to Islandia.

  Joseph pulled free, grabbed my arms, and grinned into my face. “Jenna had it hidden. She couldn’t fly it.” He laughed. “But I could. I flew it, Chelo. She told me Dad loved skimmers—I love this one, I loved flying. You could see everything. Even the New Making looked tiny.”

  Alicia jumped down and stood next to Joseph. Kayleen ran up, Liam and Akashi on her heels. “You flew it?” Kayleen asked.

  Joseph glowed, like he’d glowed after hunting, full of excitement and adrenaline. “You’ve got to try this. It’s so…so fast. I saw places we’ve never been, places someone walking could never go.”

  Jenna jumped down next, standing behind Alicia and Joseph, her eye shining with excitement. She looked around. “Odd choice for a barn.”

  Legs! “Did you see which way Legs went?” I asked.

  Akashi grunted. “He’ll come back after he quits being scared. His herd is here.” He looked at Jenna. “Where the hell were you hiding that thing? And why bring it out now?”

  She shrugged, but from the look Joseph gave me, I knew it was the cave. I squinted at the skimmer, trying to picture it rolling out of the cave, suddenly understanding why the cave floor had been so smooth. It was a landing pad. Did they clear the brush or just fly through it? Only then did I think of Artistos at all. “You know, you probably just scared the hell out of Artistos.”

  Jenna’s eye sparkled as she waved off my concerns. “We went around and came in from the sea. Joseph needed to practice flying on something small.”

  The skimmer didn’t look small to me. She’d had the skimmer and couldn’t fly it. Lack of ability to read data, or being short one arm, or both? I chewed on my lip, thinking. Altered in possession of altered technology. Joseph able to fly. Nava and Hunter would hate it. Worse, it would scare them. And I’d been worried about their reaction to hunting.

  What was Jenna doing?

  I shivered, feeling pushed, manipulated. I glared at the skimmer, wishing it away, but of course, it stayed exactly where it was, alluring and beautiful and powerful and polished.

  Stripes came up and sniffed at the nose of the skimmer, whickering softly, which started Kayleen laughing, then me, then the rest.

  But it wasn’t funny. Nothing was funny. Not now. “Come on,” I said. “Let’s go outside and catch up.” I wanted to be away from the skimmer, to be outside in familiar surroundings. To draw the others’ attention from the sleek machine.

  Liam hesitated, walking up to the skimmer, touching it. His touch reminding me of Tom’s loving inspection of the bigger and squatter shuttles the day we sent Therese’s and Steven’s ashes to the sea, the day Jinks died. Tom’s eyes had held that same look of awe and hunger.

  Liam’s face was transfixed, bright, as he walked under the skimmer, his head almost brushing the bottom, circling around to the back where the engines cooled with light crackling and popping sounds. “Can I climb inside?” he asked, directing the question to Jenna.

  Jenna smiled, apparently pleased with his interest. “You can help unload her soon. This is the Burning Void. Her range is anywhere on Jini.”

  “How many people will she hold?” Liam asked.

  “All of us,” Alicia said. “There’s room for eight. More if you’re willing to be uncomfortable.”

  If Tom had worried about the headband, what would he think now? I interrupted Liam’s entranced tour of the skimmer by saying, “You know, you three might as well have outright declared war on Artistos.”

  Alicia’s eyes flashed at me, happy and defiant. She knew. Jenna frowned. “If they saw us, they can choose to see it that way. They chose to shoot at me.”

  That stopped me cold. She was right. “I’m sorry, Jenna. I’m sorry for all the wrong things done to you, by anyone. Maybe they declared war when they beat up Bryan or when they shot at you, or years ago, before I was born. I’m sick and tired of it, too.”

  She nodded and looked away, watching the hebras who were watching her as if entranced.

  I couldn’t let it stop there. “Jenna—you’ve helped us and taught us and led us here. But I will not be led blindly into a fight. I…I still want to resolve this without anyone dying.”

  She turned toward me, a small smile on her lips. “I will let you try. But you must be willing to discuss at least defense. I am tired of being hunted, and I will not stand for more of it.”

  I swallowed and nodded, then looked at the others, who had watched the two of us, rapt. “Come on,” I insisted, desperate now to get away from the skimmer, to think through the implications. The people of Artistos had killed our parents; they would kill us if we scared them enough. “We can’t just stand here. We need to decide what to do next.”

  Jenna glanced at Stripes, who was still nuzzling up to the ship, curious and unafraid. “We should get the hebras into the corral.”

  Akashi spoke up from behind me, his voice shaking, as if he were attempting a wry sarcasm he didn’t feel. “It is an odd barn. We were trying to hide our strength from the satellites.”

  “I turned them off,” Joseph said. We all stopped, silent.

  He what?

  Did he think we were more powerful than they were? The six of us here? They still had Bryan, dammit, and we needed the colony. Or we would be hunted. Seven Jennas. We didn’t know as much as she did. They’d pick us off one by one.

  Paloma hobbled in the doorway, then stood stock-still, her mouth wide open. She shook her head, as if she, too, wanted the skimmer to disappear.

  “Look,” I said, “Kayleen and Alicia—you two get the hebras to the corral by the keeper’s cabin. And take the tack over, too. We may be making a little trip.” I glanced at the rest of them. “You four, come on. We need to talk. The others can join us as soon as they finish.”

  Silence fell. Everyone watched me. No one moved.

  I turned and started walking toward Paloma, toward the door, praying they would follow. My footsteps were the only ones I heard until I was halfway across the hangar. Three steps, seven, ten.

  Twenty.

  No one followed, no one made a sound.

  Thirty.

  Kayleen’s voice, shaky, calling to Stripes.

  Footsteps behind me. I wanted to turn around, to be sure I knew who followed me, but I was afraid that if I stopped they would stop, and time was not our friend. Satellites or not, what were our chances that no one saw, or heard, the skimmer?r />
  I kept going, passing Paloma, through the door. I didn’t stop until I could see Artistos, see if any lights came down the hill, see if they reacted to the skimmer.

  No unusual light came from town. Whether they saw the skimmer or not, they were not rushing down to overwhelm us. The others stopped near me. Enough light fell from the high windows of the hangar for me to see their faces.

  I looked to Akashi first, starting with small things I should have thought of earlier. “Do you have any earsets?”

  “Liam and I each have one.”

  I glanced at Paloma. “How about you?”

  She pursed her lips. “Tom had them, and he took them with him.”

  “So they don’t know that we can communicate with them?” I asked.

  “I’m required to carry one all the time,” Akashi said.

  “And Nava and the crowd she brought with her saw you. Have they tried to contact you?”

  He shook his head. “Not yet.”

  Why? Why was Artistos silent? I glared at Joseph, who looked sheepish, as if it was just dawning on him that turning off the satellites was a poor idea. “What else did you turn off? Can they use the earsets?”

  He looked down at the ground between his feet. “They can talk inside their immediate perimeter. That’s all.” He raised his head and stared at me. His face showed no sign of the exhilaration he’d shone with climbing up out of the Burning Void. Instead, his eyes smoldered with resentment. He used to give me looks like that when he was seven or eight and I encouraged him to set aside toys and work. He mumbled, “I left them their perimeter, so they’d be safe.” Then his head came up and he looked around at the group of us. “Where’s Tom?”

  So he hadn’t been paying attention to all the details. I found the sign of weakness oddly encouraging. I pointed to Artistos. “After you and Alicia snuck off with Jenna, Nava brought a group to invite us home. We refused. Tom went with Nava. Paloma didn’t.”

  Joseph blinked. “Oh.” Then he said, “Oh. They’re mad at us already.”

  Good. About time he felt the consequences of his choices. I chewed at my lip. “Yes. Akashi stopped them, and then he and Liam led us down here. I’m sure they suspect us of any problems on the net, especially after you turned out to be so good at fixing communications.”

  He mumbled again, “I’m sorry.”

  I watched Akashi and Paloma while I spoke to Joseph. “I think we should open communications. And restore all of Artistos’s abilities. If we’re really, really lucky, they didn’t see the skimmer. It will be invisible to them in the hangar, even with the satellites.”

  Akashi nodded encouragingly. Paloma smiled. Jenna glared at me but held her tongue. I swallowed and continued. “Okay, Joseph, be sure you can turn them back on, but hold off for a moment.” I stared at him until he nodded.

  Alicia and Kayleen jogged up. They must have made short work of corraling the hebras. Was Alicia talking Joseph into going so deep into the nets, daring so much?

  Jenna. No matter that Joseph had turned off the nets, and flown the skimmer, Jenna was the architect of his choices. “Jenna, why did you bring the skimmer?”

  She raised the eyebrow over her one eye, looking surprised that I was questioning her. Well, maybe we should question her. We’d asked her questions, but never questioned her actions before. She had been a…a goddess or something. A mythic figure. What did she want?

  She took a step back, then another, distancing herself a little from all of us. She looked like she wanted to run, but she held her ground, watching me. I was still missing something. I knew it. I looked back at Jenna. “You did not need to bring the skimmer here just to let Joseph practice flying. You’ve been hiding it for years, a treasure. What else did you bring with you?”

  Alicia answered the question for Jenna. “We brought weapons. Personal weapons, enough for all of us.”

  Jenna frowned and gave a quick hard nod. I got two quick impressions: Jenna wasn’t happy Alicia told us about the weapons, and she didn’t trust Alicia any more than I did. “Jenna?” I said.

  She nodded. “In case we need to defend ourselves.”

  Alicia added, “In case we need to save Bryan.”

  I swallowed. The bad choices were adding up fast. Saving Bryan was great, killing people in Artistos to do it wasn’t. Maybe Alicia had killed Varay. I no longer discounted the possibility. She was not like us. What had Jenna called her back in the cave? A risk-taker? Maybe a pointless risk-taker would have been a better description.

  And my brother loved her.

  I knew what to do next, anyway. And everyone was here to hear it.

  But who should contact whom?

  “Akashi? Can I use an earset?”

  He nodded, his face serious. “Liam?”

  Liam fished in his pocket, extending his palm, an earset lying loose in it. It struck me how close in size it was to a data button, and I laughed a little, thinking of my laughter over the flashlights in the cave.

  Akashi and Liam looked puzzled, so I stuffed the laughter, took the earset, and nodded at Joseph. “Turn their access back on.”

  He hesitated. “Are you sure, sis?”

  I hesitated for a moment. “Silence seems to have confused them so far, but it won’t confuse them for long. If we can at least talk to them, we might be able to figure out what they’re doing.”

  Joseph spoke up. “As far as I can tell, they’re talking. There’s not much activity in Artistos.”

  So he could see. “Do you know what they’re saying?”

  He gave me an exasperated look. “I haven’t had time to listen. I could. But I’ve been taking skimmer lessons.” He shifted uncomfortably, a slightly guilty look on his face. “Do you want to wait until morning to turn on the data?” he asked.

  “No. You gave them something. Then you took it away. Give it back.”

  Liam spoke up. “Maybe Joseph should turn on their data now, but we could wait and contact them in a few hours, so they don’t connect the two actions quite so tightly?”

  I licked my lips, glancing from the hangar to the charred plains, to the last bit of flame I could still see, a thin line of red-orange between us and Artistos. I shook my head. “That’s attractive, but I think it’s more important that we call them. I don’t want to call them in the middle of the night; that would seem too desperate. If Nava gives me her word, she’ll keep it.”

  Joseph stepped over near me, leaning on me a little. Physical closeness still helped him. I still helped him. I blinked back sudden tears. It was a small glimmer of hope. He’d gone beyond me in just a week, gone from introverted and broken to become more capable than I had ever dreamed he could be.

  To reaching too far?

  His head rested against my shoulder. His skin was still soft and childlike, his long lashes lying dark against his cheek. A surge of tenderness overwhelmed me. Perhaps Liam also saw Joseph’s vulnerability, and mine, because he stepped over and stood on the other side of me, providing stability. He smelled of smoke and hebra and, faintly, of corn bread. I inhaled deeply.

  It seemed that we stood there a long time, me centered between Joseph and Liam; Akashi watching the three of us; Kayleen standing beside Paloma, taking some of Paloma’s weight; Jenna and Alicia both standing alone.

  Stars filled the night sky. Destiny had not yet risen, and small, pale Hope was about to fall into the sea for the night. A cool breeze blew my hair back from my face, blew in the smell of the sea as well as the smoky char from the grasslands.

  I wanted Joseph to hurry, so I could talk before I lost my nerve.

  His head rose, and he blinked. “Okay, they have everything, and they know they have it all. It works better than it ever has before.” He swayed on his feet, his face pasty white. Liam stepped past me and helped him to the ground, sitting so Joseph’s head rested on his thigh.

  Joseph looked up at me, whispering, “Good luck, sis,” and then he closed his eyes. Out cold.

  I glared at Jenna. Had she let him s
leep since she took him from our camp? “Someone get him a blanket.”

  Alicia jogged over to our sleeping pile by the hangar and brought two, one for a pillow. She looked tender as she covered Joseph, running a hand along his cheek.

  I shivered and set the earset to Artistos’s frequency. The call would go to the science guild, which had doubled as Town Council headquarters under Therese and Steven. It had not been changed by the time we left. “Artistos, this is Chelo calling for Nava.”

  Silence.

  I called again.

  Gianna’s voice, high and…relieved. “Chelo? Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, we’re okay. For now. How about you?”

  “Communications are back on. They said you turned them off. That Joseph turned them off. I said he wouldn’t do that. He wouldn’t?”

  Bless her support. I said nothing, unable to explain.

  She continued. “I heard he’s working well on the nets again. Can you ask him to check on the asteroid shower trajectories? I’m seeing two that might be problems.”

  I looked down at my sleeping brother. “Yeah, Gianna, as soon as he wakes up. I’ll ask him.” I looked up at the sky; no meteors now.

  “Please don’t wait until morning,” she said.

  “Why?”

  “I just—I need better data. Joseph has been better than me at interpreting multiple data sources since he was seven.”

  I smiled at that, looking down at Joseph, who slumbered on at my feet, mouth open, snoring softly. “What do you want me to tell him, specifically?”

  “Ask him to cross-correlate the trajectories using multiple data points. I think some may come close to town, and I want someone else to verify my findings, and Joseph’s the only one who can do better than me.”

  “I’ll ask him. You can call us, you know. It’s good to hear your voice. How’s Bryan?”

  She hesitated. “I don’t know.”