“Why would you want to?” Thorpe-Campbell asks, genuinely unable to see her concerns.
“Because you can be a reckless ass, Charlie, and you know it. This is delicate. It’s a boy and his mother. It’s also potentially the most dangerous mission we’ve ever undertaken. So quit the boy-scout bull for a minute. Let’s see what Jim thinks.”
I like her for that. But I’ve already made up my mind. It happened months ago, when I decided to get on that shuttle in the desert. I felt Mum then, just like I feel her now. She’s the reason I took that leap and the reason I’m going to take this one.
“I’m in.”
The O’see sighs. “You’re sure?”
“Yeah. Just one thing: let me tell the others...I won’t be going with them.”
CHAPTER 22
Blink And You’ll Miss Us
“The last time I let you go off on your own, look what happened.” Sergei sinks back in his seat, using his cupped hands as a pillow behind his head. He closes his eyes. “You’re not going without me, so get used to it.”
“It’s not up to you,” I tell him.
“We’ll see about that.”
“But we don’t know how dangerous it is,” I insist. “What if we don’t make it back?”
He sniffs with contempt. “You’re still talking, Jim.”
“Sergei!”
“If Thorpe-Campbell doesn’t like it, he’ll have to drag me off this ship himself.”
I might have known he’d say that, and if it was any other journey I’d like nothing more than to have him tag along. But the gist of the messages we’ve received so far—an invitation for me only—doesn’t bode well for anyone who isn’t James Trillion. Thorpe-Campbell feels responsible. He encouraged Mum to leave us behind for a long sail on the dark sea, because that’s his nature—the appetite for conquest comes first, everything else is a distant second. He’s trying to make it up to us, my mum and me. I’m certain of that. But Hendron’s right, too: he is being reckless. Any chance to hop into the history books and he’ll take it. Sergei, on the other hand, is the total opposite. He doesn’t want fame or to make amends; he wants to keep me safe. Always has. It’s what his parents couldn’t do for him, and what mine failed to do for me.
Now it’s my turn to repay him. I’m going to keep him safe.
“Okay, then it’s all off. I’m not going.”
He opens an eye. “Come again?”
“You heard me. If you’re going, I’m not.”
He opens the other eye, stares me out. “Suit yourself.”
“Aagh! Stop being so stubborn!”
“You always were bad at cards. Bluffing is all about timing. Your timing sucks, Trillion. It’s obvious. We’re both going and you know it.”
“And there’s nothing I can do to change your mind?”
“Nope.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“I know.”
I relish a long, warming sigh of relief. “Thanks, Sergei.”
“Mm.”
“I mean it.”
The corner of his mouth slants into an approving smile. He quickly yawns to hide it. “You’d best tell the RAM runner his pod’s up to three.”
“Make that six,” a girl’s voice chimes in from behind us. It’s Lys. She, Rachel and Lohengrin have been sneakily listening in when I thought those seats were empty.
“We made a pact, remember?” Lys reminds me. “We stick together, whatever happens. And anyway, we’re a PriPod team now. It’s official, and we’ve decided—we’re coming with you. So you can smoke that, James Trillion.”
I scramble for a clever response, for a way to talk them out of it, but it’s no use. If I couldn’t dissuade Sergei on his own, what chance do I have arguing with all four of them? Pulling my own hair in frustration doesn’t help. They laugh and joke and wind up wrestling me onto my back on the aisle floor, where Lys pins me for a three-count. It’s their way of saying I lose, they win.
Now all they have to do is convince Thorpe-Campbell and the O’see. Five buggos instead of one. Yep, things just got way more complicated.
“Out of the question!” he snaps, whipping an angry look at his daughter.
“You’ve got to be kidding!” fumes the O’see. The minute, purple-flecked spokes in her irises spark into action. She regards each of us in turn, perhaps trying to figure out who’s dead-set on going and who’s still on the fence—a weak link she can work on. She’s an interrogator by trade, a human lie detector, able to read emotions as fast as we can feel them.
“All of you? Well, I can’t say I’m surprised, with the example you’ve been given.” She lays a scorching gaze on her opposite number. Thorpe-Campbell swallows a guilty lump in his throat. “It’s not happening, so don’t even think it,” she says. “Trillion going...we can maybe justify. It’s a rescue mission, it’s his mother, and it’s also first contact with a new species. There’s a—”
“We work better as a unit,” Lohengrin reminds her. “Isn’t that why you granted us PriPod status? You’re supposed to trust our judgement.”
“Nice try, Lohengrin, but you’re first-years, you haven’t even been inducted into Alpha yet. Christ, this is the Star Binder we’re talking about! It’s still mostly unexplored. With so little data on what we’re dealing with here, the Council would be reluctant to send an experienced pod crew, let alone a bunch of first-years.”
“She’s right. You’ll have to leave this to us.” Thorpe-Campbell’s voice digs into grave adult mode—the opposite of what I heard in the airlock. “Lys, your mum’s waiting for you at Alpha. She’s been looking forward to seeing you for eighteen months. You really want to crush her like that?”
“I know, Dad. She’s waiting for you, too. But she’ll still be there when we get back. Jim’s mum might not have that long.”
Hendron turns to Lohengrin. “And you! What do you think Their Highnesses would say if anything happened to you before you even got to Alpha?”
The prince strokes his immaculate scalpture. “I think their right to protest ended when they signed me up for all this.” His muttered reply gathers strength and volume as it goes. “And anyway, they won’t be saying anything, will they? The Hex is sealed, so we can’t go back. We can’t send word back. We’re out here on our own. This team is all we have left. If you break us apart now, you’re saying you don’t have faith in us as a unit. Do you really want to sow that doubt, O’see? In a future PriPod team?”
“Well put. But it won’t wash. This is an extraordinary mission. You don’t have the experience or the authority to—”
“Neither do you, O’see!” Rachel cuts in, claws out. Her freckled face is a blotchy pink and white, which only ever happens when she’s angry or unsure of herself—not often.
“Foggerty? Explain yourself. And drop the insolent tone.”
“Sorry, O’see. It’s just that you don’t have the authority here either.”
“I beg your pardon, young lady!”
Rachel shifts position, nervously rolls her tongue around inside her mouth as Hendron squares up to her.
“Say that again, Foggerty. I dare you.” The O’see eyeballs her at close quarters, their noses almost touching. “I don’t have the what?”
Pursing her lips, Rachel won’t look the woman in the eye. Can’t say I blame her! A spy catcher in her face? And she was trained from a young age in the strictest military hierarchy anywhere in the colonies. Do not disobey! Then I remember...she’s doing all this for me. She’s disobeying a superior...for me.
I spring to my feet. “Leave her alone.”
“Shut up, Trillion.”
“I mean it.”
It isn’t the most forceful thing I’ve ever uttered, but it’s enough to get Sergei to his feet as well. He knows me better than anyone. He can tell when I’m not messing around.
“Trillion, keep out of this. I’ve already told you I won’t stand for insubordination. Foggerty needs to remember her place.”
“But you d
on’t have the authority,” Rachel insists. “The minute you touch down on Alpha and don’t report what Mr Thorpe-Campbell’s doing here, you’ve ignored protocol. He’s breaking Initiative law by doing what he’s doing, but you’re abetting him by staying silent. So you’re complicit, you’re guilty. When I tell them you knew what he was up to all along, you’ll be busted back to a buggo quicker than light-speed. You can stare at me all you want to, but I hope you see your own reflection, Ohh-see, because as long as you’re going along with this—this mission—you don’t get to tell us we’re being insubordinate. Okay?”
For a horrible moment I’m sure the O’see is going to smack her senseless. Rachel isn’t herself right now—I’ve never seen her like this. I’m ready to call the whole thing off, but I’m afraid that would turn out even worse for Rachel. What she said about breaking protocol might strictly be true, but it’s the way she said it!
Even Thorpe-Campbell’s mouth gapes. I watch him mime a rather strong swear word. “Ah, I’m pretty sure nothing is quicker than light-speed,” he says lamely. “But I think we get the point.” He clears his throat, attempting to dispel the tension. “What we’re about to do is outside the rules. That’s why it’s so dangerous. We’re pressed for time. And I think Foggerty here was just trying to remind us to look before we leap.”
“No she wasn’t,” Sergei pipes up. “That’s that politician-speak again. She’s saying that if one of us gets the choice whether to go or not, we should all get to choose. We’re outside the law. Rules don’t apply. None of you knows what living outside the law means—only Jim and me. And Jim’s made his choice. So that’s good enough for me. For all five of us.”
The O’see finally pulls away from Rachel to address us all. “Then you’ve made up my mind as well. The mission’s cancelled. None of you are going. When this pod reaches Alpha, it stays at Alpha. I’ll not have any more arguments. I’m the O’see. I outrank everyone here. And that’s the end of it.” With that she storms off to the galley at the rear of the vessel, cursing to herself.
Rachel lifts her gaze up to me and fights back the urge to sob. Before I know it I’m holding her close, sensitive to the gentle shivers through her glowsuit, telling her in whispers that everything will be okay. She faced down the O’see for me. It’s one of the bravest things I’ve ever seen. I’m proud of her. I know the others are too.
Insolent? Well, hell. That’s what you get when you leave seventy-odd buggos in a room for six months, unsupervised. It isn’t rocket science. They left us to fend for ourselves, to think for ourselves, to make our own minds up.
Guess what?
We just did.
As we slow rapidly for our descent to Checkpoint Alpha, the O’see is true to her word. Seeing that the five of us won’t budge at her command, she orders Thorpe-Campbell to help her physically remove us.
“Sorry, Beth. I guess they’re coming with me.”
“What about Lyssa? Your daughter, Charlie. What will Sorcha say when I tell her?”
“Tell her we’ll see her soon. Tell her Lys wouldn’t abandon her pod mates. Tell her we’ll be okay.”
“Christ, Charlie. You know they’ll crucify you when you get back.”
“True.”
“Last chance. It isn’t too late to bring the Council in on this. They’d scramble together specialists, the latest weapons and equipment. You’d have a much better shot.”
“Yeah. In five years’ time. No thanks.”
“Okay, then you’ve left me no choice.” She peels off her hoodie and hurls it across the cabin, revealing a glowsuit underneath. “I’m coming with you.”
Ramirez leaps to his feet. “O’see! What about us?”
“You five are getting off here in the escape pod. The rest of us will continue on through the Binder. But you’re not to say a word until 0950! You get me?”
Ramirez quails when she steps toward him. “Yes, O’see.” His team-mates gaze at us incredulously.
“Beth, are you sure?” asks Thorpe-Campbell. “If you got off now, you wouldn’t get blamed. You could lay it all on me.”
“Oh, I intend to,” she replies. “But I’m the overseer of this class. I’m not about to lose five of my best students—even if they do all have a death wish.”
“You never would have left us, would you.”
“Not a one.”
He blows her a kiss.
The seatbelt lights flash, Sarazzin and his posse start their descent into Alpha base in the escape pod. The rest of us strap ourselves in for an unscheduled voyage...into the unknown.
Before you can say courts-martial, we’re underway again. Hendron powers up the liquid stasis chambers in the aft cargo hold, to keep us safely suspended in liquid for what she reckons will be “insane velocities for the human body to cope with.”
Thorpe-Campbell is doubtful. “The entities wouldn’t drag Jim all that way and not think of that. They’ve got something up their sleeves we haven’t thought of yet. Remember the dragonfly.”
“Granted,” she replies. “But I’d rather be safe than spaghetti, wouldn’t you?”
She gets my vote.
Before we can get properly underway, I need to make contact with the messengers, let them know we’re ready to give them control of the pod. To get us safely away from the clutches of Alpha, the O’see punches in the coordinates for another Binder station we’ve settled, Hellas, about twenty-one light-years away. Once we’re streaking, I power up my omnipod and cross my fingers.
Instead of a written message, I see a shape hovering in front of the light-streaks, where the projected letters should be. It isn’t an alien glyph, though. No, if I’m not mistaken, it’s my old friend...
“The dragonfly!”
“What’s that?” Rachel asks.
“It’s back!” And with everyone listening in, I describe in detail everything I saw and experienced in my recurring dream and the subsequent visits to the sanctum, not to mention the bizarre encounters with alien worlds. Through it all, the mysterious, silent dragonfly that was always there, hovering over me, watches me through the pod window.
“Are you the same dragonfly that found me in the Hex facility on Mars?” I get Hendron to patch my message through at UHF.
WE ARE THE DRAGONFLY — IS JAMES TRILLION READY TO GIVE US CONTROL OF HIS SHIP
“We are almost ready. Will our bodies be able to withstand such high speeds?” That one is courtesy of the O’see, something that’s been nagging at her.
JAMES TRILLION AND THOSE LIKE HIM WILL NOT BE HARMED BY THE JOURNEY — WE ARE ASSURED OF THIS
“Then we are ready to give you control of our ship. Why did you not ask James Trillion to help Ingol sooner?”
WE TRIED TO COMMUNICATE WITH JAMES TRILLION WHILE HE SLEPT — HE WAS NOT RESPONSIVE — WE CANNOT SPEAK YOUR LANGUAGE
“So how are you communicating with us now?”
THE GREAT TRANSIT IS TRANSLATING FOR US — WE COMMUNICATE VIA THE GREAT TRANSIT — IT KNOWS JAMES TRILLION — IT WILL HELP US CONTROL YOUR SHIP
“What are you?”
JAMES TRILLION HAS NO WORD TO DESCRIBE US
“Where do you come from?”
THAT IS IRRELEVANT
“Why are you helping Ingol in defiance of others like you?”
INGOL FREED US FROM OTHERS LIKE US SO WE COULD FREE INGOL
“Will you communicate with James Trillion throughout the journey?”
NO — ONCE JUMPS BEGIN NO COMMUNICATION WILL BE POSSIBLE — DOES JAMES TRILLION HAVE ENOUGH OXYGEN FOR THE JOURNEY
“Yes. Is that why you couldn't take James Trillion to Ingol before—because he didn't have enough oxygen to survive the journey?”
THAT IS CORRECT — THE GREAT TRANSIT CANNOT SUPPLY OXYGEN — WE HAD INSUFFICIENT DATA ON ACTIVE HUMAN OXYGEN CONSUMPTION — WE HAD TO RETURN JAMES TRILLION TO HEX FACILITY BEFORE HE EXPIRED
“Thank you for explaining. You can start the jumps. Just one thing first—what do I call you?”
WE HAVE NO NAME
First my scalp, then the small hairs on the back of my neck start to tickle. The shivery sensation moves slowly down, as though I’m being raised head-first, inch by inch into an invisible bath of static. The walls of the Binder shrink to fit the shape of the ship, forming that transparent, lens-like skin I remember so well from my first solo journeys. The immense pulsing tunnel is still there beyond it, and I sense we're in safe hands. I clip my omnipod to the underside of my seat and brace myself for another extraordinary ride.
“It doesn’t have a name,” I tell Rachel, who's insisted on sitting next to me for this leg of the trip.
“No? That’s a shame.” She’s nervous and fidgety as she ties her chalk-white hair into a bun.
“I think I’m gonna call him Jiminy. Jiminy Cricket.”
She flashes a smile. “Good name. But I think he was a grasshopper, not a draa...ggooonnnn...fffffllllllyyyyyyyyy...”
Fly.
“Jim, wake up!” Hasty words from close by in the darkness. “Jim, wake up. We’re there.”
Heavy eyelids don’t want me to open up shop just yet, but an even heavier heartbeat does. Wow, that thing is whacking away inside my ribs. So I stretch and yawn and force my slit of a gaze into focus.
When it’s clear what I’m looking at, I nearly vault out of my seat. “What the—”
“Say hi to Jiminy,” says Rachel.
Yeah, right. That Jiminy’s now scurrying across my window, bigger than ever, staring in at me with cold bug eyes, isn’t quite what this Pinocchio had in mind. The dragonfly is definitely mechanical—it has a copper metallic skin—but there’s also something...off about it. As though it hasn’t quite been finished. Like a copy of an old, faded original where the details were a bit vague and fuzzy to begin with.
I don’t know what to make of that.
“We were out seventeen hours?” I ask.
“The ship’s gauges didn’t record anything,” replies the O’see.
“Course they wouldn’t—they’re too hi-tech. Too fancy.” Thorpe-Campbell performs star jumps in the aisle. “Everything on these pods is too fancy.” And he stops to roll up his sleeve. “Old school clockwork wristwatch, can’t go wrong. Roughly seventeen hours and forty-four minutes since we blacked out.”
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