by Merry Farmer
Again Jeff answered with a bare nod.
Danny shook his head. “Why attack the soldiers if you knew our settlement was just as well-supplied? We’re helpless compared to this lot.”
If possible, Jeff closed in on himself even more. His eyes darted side to side, as if the Bogey man were waiting in the shadows of the swaying trees.
“We took the food,” he murmured, almost too low for Danny to hear, “but that wasn’t why Kutrosky sent us.”
Danny checked on the guards over his shoulder. They were still deep in discussion. He edged closer to Jeff. “Why did he send you?”
Wariness sharpened Jeff’s features. His breath frosted in shallow puffs in front of him as he swayed on his spot. Light flakes of snow began to fall around them.
“He’s looking for something,” he said at last. “Something she has.”
“She?” It was a pointless question. He could only mean Grace. Danny glanced up at the sky, flurries growing heavier by the minute. Without waiting for an answer from Jeff, he said, “Where is Kutrosky now? Where is his camp?”
“I told them I don’t know,” Jeff whispered, “but it’s north of here. Only about a day’s journey. The land makes hills here. Like a meteor hit somewhere far north ages ago and created ripples like a puddle. I counted five ripples when we came here to raid. He’s dug in beyond that.”
Danny stared at him, letting the information sink in. Kutrosky was only a day away. He was after Grace for something. His men were desperate enough to steal food as they looked for it. They would be easy targets. All he needed was healthy, motivated soldiers to sweep over the hills and assault them. Soldiers who were ready for a change in leadership. He glanced over his shoulder at the guards.
They looked up to check on Danny and Jeff at the same time. Their conversation ended abruptly.
“You’re supposed to be working, not talking,” the one who had offered him a rest said.
Danny nodded to the man and retrieved his axe. He gritted his teeth and resumed chopping. The pain was far more bearable now. Jeff returned to his work. They shared one final nod, and the conversation was over. Danny had what he needed anyhow. The snow was falling, which meant Grace was about to make her move.
The planetarium had been cool and dark. Classes had been over for the day an hour ago, and as usual the star-scape relative to the Argo’s position spread out around them, showing off their place in the universe. The tiny marked dot of Sol had just barely been visible at the far edge of the room. They were still months and months away from the dot of Rukh around which Terra orbited.
Danny had seen Grace go into the planetarium for the astronomy class, but he hadn’t seen her leave. It was ridiculous of him to be nervous about talking to a woman, but that didn’t stop the twist of acid from ravaging his gut as he walked slowly down the center aisle, hands in his pockets, scanning for her. He fully expected this feeble attempt at having a social life to implode like every other plan in his life. Part of him wanted to turn around and leave the room.
“Danny, right?”
His heart shot to his throat and he turned to find Grace sitting in the middle of the row he’d just passed.
“Your name is Danny, isn’t it? I think we met at the launch site.” She sat forward. “I’m Grace, remember?”
“Yes, of course I remember.” He pretended to glance around as if he might have an actual reason to be there, then scooted into the row with Grace. “It’s nice to see you again.” He took his hand out of his pocket and reached to shake hers. Foolish as ever.
She surprised him by taking his hand without hesitation. Her skin was soft and cool. The faint scent of flowers—beautiful living things—surrounded her. “Here. Sit down. I was just indulging in a little daydreaming after class.”
He sat beside her, glancing from the canopy of stars above to her profile in the dark. She smiled, eyes twinkling like the lights above them.
“Do you usually stick around after astronomy class to daydream?” he asked, already knowing the answer.
“Not usually.” She shook her head. “I was just feeling…I don’t know.”
“Homesick?”
She laughed, light as a summer breeze. “Not exactly. Well, sort of.”
She turned to look at him. Half of her face was illuminated by starlight, the other clothed in darkness. Wisps of her red hair glowed like a halo around her head.
“Sort of?” he prompted her.
She shrugged. “Homesick for the home we haven’t reached yet.”
“For Terra?” He sounded like an idiot. She’d be laughing about him to that friend of hers, Carrie, later.
“I can’t wait to get there.” She sighed, looking up.
The prospect sent an itch down his back. “Really?”
Surprised, she raised her eyebrows at him. “Yes.” She laughed, pure, like running water. “Think of the possibility. Think of what we’re doing.”
He gave her a noncommittal shrug, hiding the fact that he knew full well what they were doing. More than she did. More than she would ever know or ever want to know. It wasn’t something to smile about.
Her laughter deepened. “You’re a scientist, aren’t you?”
He colored in the dark. If ever there was a time to lie it was now. “A geneticist,” he found himself unable to do it, not to her.
“So you should know then.”
“Know what?”
“What we’re creating here. Or there, rather.”
“We’re building a colony.” He shifted in his seat, wondering if she’d found out something she wasn’t supposed to know.
She shook her head. “We’re building a dream.” She blinked at him when he didn’t share her enthusiasm. “Haven’t you ever thought of it, Danny? We are the beginning. No one knows how life started on Earth, but we know how it starts on Terra. The moment we set foot on that planet we will be the creators. Who knows? Someday we may even be deified as the Terran Gods.”
“Ah, you’re one of those.” A ripple of disappointment sank his shoulders.
“No, no. Well, no, not really. I’m not a Universalist. The universe is a little more random than all that.” His smile returned. “What I mean is, we get to start from scratch. Where we’re going, everything is new.”
“Base One has been there for over fifty years,” he reminded her, annoyed with himself for doing anything but agreeing with her.
“Fifty years. In the whole span of human history that’s like the blink of an eye,” she insisted. “Imagine what lies beyond that.”
She leaned back in her chair and stared up at the fake star-scape with the wonder of a child. His blood rushed through his veins, his nerves tingled at the line of her neck, of her chest as it rose and fell with expectant breaths.
“We are the beginning of a whole new civilization, Danny. We will shape it, make it better. We have it in our power to start over with no mistakes. The world we create will be free. Free from war and discrimination, free from the insanity of money and property. Free from the division of nations. Everyone will help each other, work together. We can make it that way.”
“I love you.” He blurted it out before he could stop himself. She tore her eyes from the heavens and popped them wide at him. “I love the way you think,” he covered, pretending absolute calm while his senses went crazy. “I’ve never met anyone like you, anyone with your…enthusiasm for this project.”
“How could anyone feel any differently about it?” She laughed at him, resting her hand on his on the arm between their seats. Her fingers threaded through his and he sucked in a breath at the sensual slide of her skin.
“I suppose you have a point.” He barely managed to squeeze the words out.
His life as he knew it had just ended.
Deep in the night, long after the village had hunkered down and gone to sleep, the snow that had grown thick enough to dump four more inches on top of ice-hardened drifts tapered off. Danny lay awake on the mattress he’d been given on the floor of
a one-room cabin belonging to a soldier and a woman who had run from Kutrosky the day Grace left. He hadn’t bothered to remove his glasses. The events of the day zipped through his mind as he stared at the shuttered window, waiting for chinks of light to appear through its cracks.
Kutrosky was within his grasp. One day, and he could make the man pay for all the pain he’d caused. One day, and he could bring relief to the men and women starving because of him. One day, and he could regain Grace’s trust.
He waited as long as he could before pushing himself to action. When the faintest lines of dawn outlined the edges of the windows, he rolled off of his mattress and crawled across the floor to where Stacey slept in a cocoon of furs near the fire. Dull pain radiated through his hands and feet, but he could take it. He could take anything to get Grace’s mission and his own justice over with.
“It’s time,” he whispered, shaking Stacey awake.
Stacey sucked in a breath as if she hadn’t been sleeping either and murmured, “Okay.”
As silently as they could, the two of them searched the dark room for their things. The pouch of bullets was still deep in Danny’s pocket, safe and solid against this thigh. It was too much to hope that he could find a gun in the cabin to load them into and take with him. He donned his parka and felt along the shelves for a spare scarf.
The crash of something heavy behind him rubbed his nerves raw and he tensed.
“Shit,” Stacey hissed in the dark.
Whatever she’d dropped, it woke their hosts. Danny dashed across the room to grab her arm and drag her toward the door, whether she was ready or not.
“Wait.” The tenor voice of the soldier stopped them.
Danny danced to the balls of his aching toes, the urge to run almost overpowering. Stacey held him back. The soldier rose from his bed, his woman behind him. Their outlines were still and solid in the dark. Without lighting a candle, the soldier crossed to a row of baskets against one wall. As he rifled through one of the baskets, Danny shifted toward the door. The soldier found what he was looking for and brought it to them.
Danny backed away. He hesitated when the soldier held a soft, bulky object out to him, a sack.
“It’s food,” the man said. “I thought you might need it.”
Danny’s shoulders unclenched and he stared at the sack, uncomprehending.
“You’re helping us?” Stacey found words first.
The soldier thrust the sack into Danny’s hands. “It’s time we came together instead of guarding against each other.”
“Some of us know that, others don’t,” the woman added.
Grace. It had to be Grace. Her idealism had gotten to the couple standing in front of him. She’d been doing far more than growing round with child and being bullied by Kinn all through the winter. And, God, how he loved her for it.
“Thanks.” He nodded, tucking the sack under his parka and tying it to his belt. Without another word, he and Stacey stole out into the predawn.
The thick, snowy dark masked the sound of their footsteps as they hurried down the main street of the settlement, past the silent longhouse, and off along the path that lead to the river. They squinted in an effort to make out landmarks in the darkness, distinct trees that rose above the others, the snow-covered mounds that marked the entrances to caves. The indistinct glow of coral dawn kissing the horizon through a frozen mist was hardly enough for them to see more than a few feet in front of them. The snow may have stopped, but moisture continued to hang in the air.
Danny had memorized the map Grace had given him, but pulled it out again and studied it in the darkness when it came time for them to cut off the path. Stacey huddled against his side, breath tense in his ear. She depended on him to get this right. Lots of people were depending on him. His pulse quickened.
“It’s this way.” Heather’s voice whispered, seemingly from nowhere.
Danny popped his head up to search for her, embarrassed to be so relieved to hear the voice of a trouble-making teenager. She was well-camouflaged. He didn’t see her until she moved enough for her outline to be seen against the snow.
Adrenaline pushed him off the path and into the dark wood. “So you’re involved in this too?” he whispered.
Stacey stayed close behind him as they waded through knee-high snow to the place Heather and Jonah waited. The layer of ice on top of softer snow cut into his shins. They should be trying to walk on top of the ice, with or without snowshoes, instead of leaving tracks so bold a blind man could follow them on a moonless night.
“I wanna help,” Heather answered, unusually subdued.
“Doesn’t that make a change,” he jabbed, lips twitching to a grin. He reached her side and squeezed a hand over her shoulder.
She smiled. “It’s my cave anyhow.”
There was a story behind her statement that he was sure would be the stuff of campfire chatter, once he had time to listen to tall tales. Right now they had other things to do. All he wanted was to get to the red X on Grace’s map. To get to Grace.
“I’ll meet you there,” Jonah whispered, stomping off with some sort of huge branch in his arms.
“What the hell is he doing?” Stacey squinted as she watched him go. She moved forward, following Heather blindly.
“Crossing our tracks.” It was all the explanation she was going to give but it was enough. They were playing children’s games in the woods.
Without snowshoes it was a slow slog. It was possible to walk on the layer of ice for short distances, but every few yards, without warning, they would sink thigh-deep in drifts. The new snow was wet and they were all soaked in no time. Danny’s hands and feet throbbed, but he refused to show any sign of weakness. If Grace was waiting for him, he would wade through fire. He willfully lost track of time focusing on her, on what he would do for her, on what he already had done for her, on taking her home. On going after Kutrosky.
The faint orange glow of firelight signaled their arrival at Heather’s cave. A fire blazed inside, its smoke rising up through crevices in the ceiling. It was larger than any of the caves on their side of the river with striated walls revealing quartz deposits. If anyone knew the first thing about geology, Danny was sure this cave would send them into raptures. All it meant for him was warmth and rest.
He shuffled straight to the fire to warm up and dry out. His brow lifted when he saw both his and Stacey’s backpacks resting against one wall along with four sets of skis. He left the fire and retrieved his backpack, flipping it open and searching through the contents.
“Where’s the gun?”
Heather shrugged. “I couldn’t find it. Kinn probably threw it out.”
He cursed and tossed the backpack aside, searching the room for other weapons. There were none. He rubbed a hand over the stubbly growth on his chin. Escaping from Kinn was one thing, but they weren’t prepared at all for a confrontation with Kutrosky.
“Danny? You okay?” Stacey watched him from the fire.
“What do you think?” he mumbled. He untied the sack of food at his waist and tossed it against the wall. Without continuing the conversation, he snatched up his pack again and searched through it for a dry pair of socks.
Two sets of feminine eyes watched him thunder away in wary silence. God help him, but he felt guilty for disappointing them. They deserved better.
“Where’s Grace?” he asked, not looking at either of them.
“She’s not here yet,” Heather replied, too much hesitation in her voice. “I came ahead to light the fire and bring supplies. I’ve been stashing stuff in here for the last few days, ever since we made plans to get you out.”
“But Grace?” he prompted.
Heather opened her mouth, but no sound came out.
“She wasn’t sure she’d be able to give Kinn the slip,” Stacey answered. She hesitated until he pinned her with a sharp stare. “He keeps her under lock and key.”
Danny swayed toward the cave’s entrance, contemplating his odds if he marched back i
nto the settlement to get her. The sharp ache in his hands and feet gave him a dismal glimpse of his chances.
“She told me she would be here,” Heather insisted. “She’d do anything to be here.”
He ground his teeth, holding his breath. The weariness of working like a slave for days and not sleeping caught up to him. He let his backpack drop and took his dry socks to the fire.
“Good job.” He patted Heather’s shoulder before sinking to sit with his back to the cave wall, pulling his parka off. If Grace wanted to be here, she would find a way.
Heather broke into a pleased smile. “Here,” she skittered across the cave to grab a basket, bringing it to him. “I know you like the purplish ones.”
The basket was full of fruit. It was withered and wrinkled but he hadn’t had fruit for so long that he didn’t care.
“Thank you, Heather.” He rewarded her with an appreciative smile.
She sat leaning against his side, Stacey across the fire from them. He met Stacey’s eyes over the flames. She smirked and shook her head. He took a bite of the fruit, pulpy and sweet, closed his eyes, and thought of Grace.
They had a long time to wait. Dawn was only just breaking, and aside from Grace, Jonah hadn’t returned. Danny dozed off in the warm silence that none of them was willing to break. His body rebelled against everything he wanted to do, muscles loosening and mind growing foggy.
When at last he heard Grace prompting, “Danny. Danny wake up,” he wasn’t sure if it was reality or a dream.
“Danny.”
She squatted beside him, nudged his shoulder. He blinked to full wakefulness in the dim orange firelight, sucked in a breath, and gazed up into her sparkling green eyes. The firelight made the red of her hair a supernatural halo.
“Grace.” He smiled, peace filling him. He rested a hand against her cheek. “You’re here. I’ve missed you so—” He clamped his mouth shut over the tender words his sleepy mind hadn’t censored.
She lowered her head, hand covering his, and squeezed her eyes closed as her features contorted into misery.