A deep grumbling follows. I hear a single, violent shriek through the comm. Rocks shift all around me. My eyes dart to the scanner, the windows. I’ve got no visuals at all.
“What the hell was that?” I ask. “Is everyone all right?”
Jaime responds from up top. “Conveyor shaft collapsed again.”
Then Anton is shouting. “Morning! Are you there, Morning?”
There’s no response. Only Anton’s heavy breathing, a grunt.
“She was in there!” Anton shouts. “Jaime, can you see anything on the screen?”
We’re all asterisks on the computer. Panicking, I make the count.
Four. Only four of us.
“Negative,” Jaime answers. “Right before it happened, her asterisk vanished.”
“Shit,” Anton says. “Get over here now.”
I have no idea what’s going on above, but I can see the comet streak of our conveyor shafts on the screen. I’m about fifty meters above the end of the tunnel. On the screen, it looks like a black claw has slashed the shaft in two. Morning’s in there somewhere.
There is nothing to think about. There is no decision to make. There is only my body moving toward hers.
I unstrap from my chair. In a side compartment of the drill casing, I find the emergency supplies. Rope, oxygen tanks, and a ton of gauze. I attach everything to my suit’s utility belt and hook the rope carabiner to the top of the drill. We all learned this in the simulator, but it takes a few extra seconds to make my nervous hands repeat the steps I practiced. I hook the rope under my arms and around my waist, cinch it tight, and give a tug. It holds.
Slowly I lower myself over the lip of the drill. I avoid the extended claws, knowing they’d burn through suit and skin with a touch. Down into heat, into the hole I’ve been carving for hours. Darkness swallows me. I flick on my shoulder light, and a bright beam spotlights the wall. I take it slow, knowing a fall and a broken neck won’t help Morning. Voices pipe through as I descend. A curse from Anton. A question from Azima. Every word colored with fear.
Morning had us download digital reads of the mine before we started. Blinking, I pull up the map on my scouter. I’ve lowered myself just above the conveyor shaft, but I still can’t see the mouth of the tunnel. Below, nyxia glitters in chaotic piles. Another meter and my feet find empty air. Reaching down, I trace the lip of the conveyor shaft with a hand. It takes a little twist to lower myself inside.
I detach the rope, and my shoulder light flashes up an undisturbed tunnel. God, it’s small. Hardly big enough to walk down. I crouch forward, heat knifing through my suit and turning my stomach. Red spots leap across my vision. The map shows gas pockets gathering in the second shaft, some ten meters beneath my hands and knees. I steady my breathing and keep crawling forward. Morning is the only thought in my head. I have to find Morning.
Finally the light lands on shattered rocks. Charred air and twisted stone. I shovel what I can behind me and come to the largest pile of nyxian rubble, all strewn around a dark form.
“Emmett,” Jaime’s voice sounds over the comm. “You’ve got red sneaking up on you.”
“Copy that.” My hands dig frantically at the stones. Even with my suit and triple-thick gloves, it’s like plucking pieces of meat from a sizzling grill with bare hands. I’m halfway to the dark bulge beneath the rocks when Jaime pipes in again.
“We moved too much down there,” he says. “It’s going to release. I’m pulling the drill.”
I grunt, knowing my rope will get pulled with it. Knowing it’s too late to crawl back that direction anyway. The only way out now is forward. Gritting my teeth, I slide rocks away until I’ve unearthed a dark sphere of stone. I crouch over it. It isn’t a shard like the rest; it’s smooth as a tomb and cold as a creek. I lower a shoulder, trying to wedge it out.
Nothing happens. I glance back down the tunnel and hear a click. The massive sphere unfolds in circular strips, peeling away from the center like an orange. The dark casing slides back, and Morning smiles out at me.
“You came for me,” she says. “You shouldn’t have.”
Relief thunders in my chest. “You’re alive.”
She takes my hand and crawls out of the shell. With a manipulation, she draws the protective cocoon back into the form of her nyxian jacket. She must have thrown it over herself just before the tunnel collapsed. We’re still trapped between a rock pile and the creeping gases behind us, though. On my scouter, red dots are blossoming. I think back to all the times I died in the simulations. We have less than two minutes. “You have a plan, right?”
Morning flips on her comm. “Retract the drill. Move the truck. Everyone out of the tunnels. We’re coming up.” She turns her attention to the pile of nyxia. “These pieces are all shattered. So it’s not one big piece anymore, right?”
I stare at the pile. “We don’t have time to manipulate all of them.”
“No,” Morning says. “Not even close. But we can do all the loosened pieces at once.”
My panic doubles. “That’s not possible.”
“Do you trust me?” she asks.
Red curls to life in my readout, fighting for open air. Pressure will release, and pretty soon it won’t matter whether I trust her or not. “Let’s do it.”
“All right, it’s like what we did on the Waterway ships. You would feed Longwei energy, right? Add your strength to his to move faster?” She waits for me to nod. “It’s kind of like that, but we’re going to make a circle. I’m pushing energy to you as you push it to me. I’m receiving energy from you as you receive it from me. Make sense?”
“Yeah, yeah, I got it. And then what?”
“Once we have it moving,” she says, “we’ll take on the pile of stones. Imagine dust.”
Morning digs through the pile and finds the largest chunk she can. She sets it between us and meets my eyes. The stone resists my first grasping effort. I take a breath, focus my mind, and reach for it again. Our connection clicks to life. I can feel Morning across the nyxian link. Slowly I start to push some of my energy forward, through the stone, in her direction.
It’s answered immediately on her end. She’s pushing energy to me, and I can feel it pulsing; the hairs on the back of my neck rise as a circle starts to form. Push and pull. Energy that’s moving in a constant circle and gaining momentum. It’s a use of nyxia I never learned aboard Genesis 11. It takes about ten seconds to establish a rhythm, churning in the air around us. It almost feels like the power is orbiting us, forming a new center of gravity.
Morning nods toward the pile and we turn, our steps in perfect harmony.
I think about Defoe showing off on the ship. The way he manipulated the massive slab of nyxia into squares and cylinders and pyramids, so quick it looked like child’s play. I know the pile in front of us is five times bigger, and full of shattered, shapeless pieces. An impossibility, but as the energy turning between us reaches a peak, I know we’re strong enough.
“You guys need to get out now,” Jaime pipes through the comm.
As one, we reach out. Our feet dig into matching stances. Even her breathing is completely in tune with mine. One breath, two breaths, three. We begin.
The force inside all that nyxia almost takes control. It’s more powerful than anything I ever felt on the ship. Dark faces come rushing forward, a strength that smacks into us like the warning wave of a tsunami. But together we stand our ground. We shoulder back the grasping hands in the substance, and our power cracks like a whip.
My eyesight flickers as every piece blocking our path grinds, shudders, and pulverizes. Dust fills the shaft, and it’s only sheer luck that we stumble toward one another. My remaining energy is a thin, dying thing. Morning is smaller than me, more staggered by the weight of all that power. I catch her arm and drape it over one shoulder. “Hold your breath.”
We stumble
forward like firemen. Coughing and blinded, I force a path through the slanting shafts of falling powder and dust. Our efforts almost run us right into Anton.
“How the hell did you do that?” he asks. “All that nyxia just crumbled to dust.”
“Get her other side!” I shout. “We have to get out.”
He snakes past us and adds his strength to mine. We lurch forward, crouched and tripping over ourselves. Speaker stands guard at the entrance. He moves aside as we pour out, falling into the dirt and taking great gasps of fresh air. Behind us, explosions rip through the ground.
I turn in time to see Speaker manipulating nyxia, sealing both conveyor shafts. Everything shakes and quivers. Jaime’s driving the truck toward us. Behind him we see a snaking tongue of fire sear the air. It almost looks fake, a Hollywood explosion. Black smoke circles everything. Wind disfigures the perfect edges. We watch dark shapes writhe in the air.
No one says anything for a long time.
It’s Speaker who finally breaks the silence.
“I’m starting to believe your species lives more exciting lives than ours.”
Even Morning laughs as smoke colors the sky.
Everyone is eager to pack up and head back to Foundry after that.
As we do, Morning comes up with seven new procedural rules for mining the shafts, even though she’s the only one who was breaking them in the first place. She laughs and leads us like nothing happened. Maybe I’m the only one who can see the change.
There’s a gentleness she offers only to me.
I’ve seen this side of her before, but only in glimpses. A shared song as we looked down on Magnia for the first time. The quiet whispers before we fell asleep in her room. The hug she gave me after landing safely. But something about the way she looks at me now feels more permanent.
It fills me with a light that I thought Babel took from me. It’s the first sign on a long road back to something good. As our truck cruises through foreign valleys—all full of fading light—I can almost feel Bilal’s and Kaya’s spirits urging me to hold on to this first ray of hope.
Kit greets us at the edge of Foundry. We climb out of the truck and circle to the back as he counts the payload. “How’d we do?” Anton asks. “Were we good boys and girls today?”
“Pulled more than the other crews,” Kit says, still scanning the rows with his enhanced glove. “Longwei will be pissed. He’s been hounding me about the totals. I keep telling him there’s not a scoreboard down here, but he won’t listen. I’m surprised by your numbers, though. This is a lot of nyxia to pull from just one mine.”
“That’s because we pitted two,” Anton replies. “Try and keep up, rookie.”
Kit raises one eyebrow. “Impressive. I’ll take it from here. The truck will get retooled and you’ll be ready to roll tomorrow morning. We’re setting a great pace.”
I can’t help but notice the word we. Kit really thinks we’re all one pristine unit, working together for some common Babel good. He thinks this is actually our team of choice.
“When will you send up the first shipment of nyxia?” Anton asks.
Kit’s scrolling through an interface, eyeing numbers in some kind of spreadsheet. Morning flashes Anton a quick look. He returns it with a calm I’ve got this gesture. Thankfully, Kit’s too distracted to notice the exchange.
“Maybe day five?” Kit replies. “The silo has to reach capacity before we send up a shipment, but I can’t wait to hit the launch button. It’s like science class on steroids.”
Anton just nods like he’s not really that interested. I catch another look between him and Morning, but when I raise an eyebrow, Morning just shakes her head. I feel a little flash of jealousy. I want to be in on the plan. I want to be her go-to. But at least they have a plan. Deep down, I know she’s just being smart, not wanting to risk letting Babel in on the secret.
The sun’s almost set, and Foundry’s lights have flickered on. Overhead, the two moons have rotated slightly. I trace the red veins on Magness’s surface, trying to memorize their pattern.
“You must excuse me,” Speaker says. “The Interstellar Contract asks that we stay outside the boundaries of the base. I must join my brothers, but I look forward to more time with you.”
Azima waves back. Jaime offers a little salute.
I nod his way. “Take it easy, Speak.”
He smiles at the nickname before heading out. Morning drifts to my side as the whole group approaches Foundry’s open entryway. Her voice isn’t louder than a whisper.
“Remember to be careful. Isadora isn’t going to forget about you.”
“You got my back, though, right?”
She nods. “And I owe you one for saving me down in the tunnel. Just don’t try to cash in that favor anytime soon, yeah?”
“Wasn’t exactly planning on trading life-threatening situations with you.”
Morning smiles. “We might not have much choice down here.”
Azima and Jaime lead us into the tower. I can already hear Katsu’s laugh dominating the shared space. The group is slouched around a circular table in the middle of the room. I search the gathering for Isadora and breathe a sigh of relief when I don’t find those rigid shoulders, that dark stare, the familiar crowned-eight tattoo.
Anton eyes the group before saying, “I need to get my beauty sleep.”
He walks toward Hive-3 with purpose. Maybe he’s going to work on whatever plan they have brewing. Azima moves in the opposite direction, charmed forward by all the noise. A roar from Katsu’s crew lures the rest of us in too. “Seriously?” Katsu complains. “This is unreal!”
It’s a surprise to find one of the Imago with them after Speaker just said they couldn’t come inside. It’s a bigger surprise to find Longwei sitting down with the group, playing cards.
And then the surprise to end all surprises: Longwei’s actually smiling.
He made such a habit of avoiding us on Genesis 11 that seeing him deal a hand of cards feels like sighting a mirage. Jazzy plucks up a single card before waving at us.
“Come on over, y’all,” she says. “Ever play forehead stud?”
Alex has his golden curls pushed back by a headband. He grins and makes the name of the game clear by slapping a card against his forehead: two of diamonds. Noor adjusts her black hijab and does the same, flashing the queen of spades. We stand around the table and watch as the others follow suit, everyone but Longwei.
“We wanted to teach Bally how to play,” Katsu explains. “The sooner he knows which cards are which, the sooner I can start winning money off of him.”
Bally holds a nine of clubs to his forehead. “If we were playing for money, so far all of it would be in Longwei’s pockets. I spent all day with him and he didn’t say a single word. But offer a little competition and he transforms into this.”
We glance that way and find Longwei with a playful hand hovering over his unturned card. Everyone waits in anticipation as he locks eyes with Bally.
“Are you worried I’ll have the highest card again?” he asks.
Bally frowns. “It seems statistically unlikely.”
Longwei lifts the card slowly to his forehead. We all lean forward, and the table erupts when the ace of spades appears. Alex actually stumbles to his feet and shakes Longwei by the shoulders, like he just scored the winning goal in a soccer game or something. I laugh when Longwei presses the card in and it sticks to his forehead. He raises both hands in triumph.
Bally nods before standing. “I think it is time for me to return to our camp before I get in trouble because Katsu forced me to come inside. Tomorrow I will teach you some of our games. We will see if your luck holds, Longwei.”
Longwei dips his head in acknowledgment. The card flutters down to the table.
“I look forward to it, Bally.”
The others le
an back in their chairs as Bally exits. Katsu kicks his feet up on the table. I claim the seat across from him. Morning eyes the room again and—when she’s satisfied Isadora isn’t a present threat—decides to join us.
“Your dig go all right?” I ask. “No issues?”
Katsu shrugs. “Same old stuff. Dig a hole. Grab the nyxia. Blah, blah, blah.”
“It went well,” Noor chimes in. “Katsu’s a good leader.”
He waves the comment away. “So…you haven’t figured it out yet?” He nods over to Longwei and the others. “I told you. I knew they wouldn’t figure it out. The game was a distraction, but still…Morning, the proclaimed genius of Genesis 12, even she must bow before my eternal wit and wisdom and cunning.”
Their group exchanges smiles. It takes me about two seconds to finally notice what’s so different about all of them. Their smiles. I can actually see their full smiles.
“You’re not wearing your masks.”
“Emmett rings the obvious bell first.” Katsu grins. “But now let’s head into the uncharted territory where dwell the real mysteries. How the hell can you understand what I’m saying?”
I stare at them, completely lost. Morning reaches for her mask and pulls it off.
“You can understand me?” she asks. “Without the mask?”
Katsu just smiles. “We figured it out during our dig.”
“I don’t get it,” I say. “How’s that possible? Are you—I mean, you don’t speak English?”
“And you don’t speak Japanese,” he replies. “Yet here we are, having a conversation with each other.”
Noor’s face brightens. “It’s weird, isn’t it?”
Jazzy leans forward like it’s the juiciest piece of gossip. “Here’s my theory: Those masks? They retrained our brains, y’all. Maybe we just know things now. Like—I don’t know—like there was dormant knowledge that’s woken up or something.”
“Or there is another explanation,” Longwei suggests. “It only works with spoken language. I wrote down a few Chinese characters, and the others couldn’t understand them.”
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