by K. A. Holt
“I’m working on a hack for her com-bracelet, so hopefully in the next day or so I’ll try to contact her.”
“Well, give me a buzz if you find anything out, okay? If I don’t hear from you, I’ll just figure your sad little brain couldn’t handle the onslaught of work it’s having to do these days.”
“Ha-ha, frog lips.” Now it was my turn to pause. “If we do go out of range before you and I talk again, Stink, well, thanks for being there to help me out with all of this crazy stuff. You really are a great friend.” I hadn’t expected to say the long good-bye to Stinky this morning and I felt a little awkward.
“Yeah, yeah, fartblossom, you’re a good friend, too.”
We both laughed.
“See you, man,” I said.
“See you.”
I put the peapod back in my pocket and headed out of the restroom toward the apartment. I needed to hustle.
I snuck through the front door and hurried to my room, trying not to alert any of Mr. Shugabert’s motion-activated messages.
Once in my room, I pushed the square button on the far wall, and my desk and computer slid up from the floor. A bench popped out under the desk and I sat down and powered up my computer. I synced up my handheld to the computer so I could get a readout of the progress on my com-bracelet hack.
Looking down at my handheld, I caught a flash of light out of the corner of my eye. I glanced up and saw a small IM pictoscreen in the corner of my monitor. Weird. The image was fuzzy and black and white, which was even stranger. Squinting, I leaned closer to the monitor to see what was going on.
I gasped.
It was Nita! My hack had worked!
“Mike?” Nita’s voice was barely audible over the static. “Is that you?”
“Nita?” I said into the built-in microphone on my computer.
“I don’t … lot of time, Mi …” She was breaking up badly. But I could tell there was something in her voice. Something I didn’t recognize. She was … scared.
“Your com-bracelet,” I blurted. “The hack … it worked…. I should go get Mom and Dad.” I stood up quickly, tripping on the bench.
“No.” She propelled her face closer to the bracelet. “Not get … and Dad. Just shut up and li … to me.”
Ah. There was the Nita I recognized. Here I was the one who found her and she was giving the orders.
She continued at a fast clip with only a few words clear enough for me to hear. “I need … tell you some important … Mike. And I don’t want … ask any … or do anything stupid.”
“Nita. Wait. I can’t understand you. Let me mess with the signal for a minute…. Can you just keep talking so I can—”
“I just said … Mike. Just shut … and lis—”
“Where are you?” I interrupted. “Are you okay? Are you with the EFEs?”
She nodded. “Long story …”
“So you did this,” I said, surprised at the anger welling up in me. “You ran off on purpose?”
She shook her head. “Not now … No time. I’ve uncovered … information, Mike … last Mars mission …”
She was barely coming through at all now and I impulsively smacked my computer monitor to try to miraculously fix the poor reception.
“… passenger manifest … last trip … Hazel-wood …”
There was a pause, and I thought the connection had been broken. I jumped up and nearly turned the computer off so that I could try to manually boost the signal. But her image appeared again. I stared at the salt-and-pepper static of her face and scrunched up my own. Her mouth was moving again, but I couldn’t hear anything. I kept motioning with my arms and cupping my hands to my ears to indicate to her that I couldn’t hear her. Then I felt like a moron. Just because I couldn’t hear her, it didn’t mean she couldn’t hear me.
I leaned in close to the microphone and said, “I can’t hear anything you’re sa—”
Suddenly her voice crackled back to life. She sounded impatient. “Da … Hazelwood … president… Project!”
“David Hazelwood?” I asked. Was Nita saying that David Hazelwood had been on the first mission? She couldn’t be. That wouldn’t make any sense at all. The company would never have risked sending their then president out on a dangerous mission. Besides, after two years the public would have heard about his disappearance. Mom said he had “retired early.”
Nita’s mouth was again moving with no sound. Finally her voice rang out: “Sabotaged the ship!”
It took a second for what she had said to sink in and then I was flabbergasted.
“What? Who sabotaged the ship? David Hazel-wood? Which ship?” I felt my stomach turn ice-cold. “Nita? What are you talking about?”
“… ora. Mike … she knows. No-bid contracts … destruction … all planets … terraform. Destroy.”
She wasn’t making any sense at all now. I grabbed my handheld and started writing down the words she was saying. Maybe I could puzzle them together.
Nita was still talking, faster now and in a lower voice. “Haze … company charter. Aurora … money-crazed. Spirit … lost … Fold. Hub … will know. Must find … Suspicious … Mom and Da—”
I was scribbling like crazy, trying to take down every sound she was making.
“… isn’t safe. EFEs … they say … Hubble … alive.”
“Nita!” I nearly shouted. “Slow down. I can’t understand y—” But she was barreling on.
“Can’t tell … Mom and Dad…. Think … danger. You, too. Sojourner is going to be … just like … Spirit was … Aurora. Cover-up. Not a secret.”
My mind was spinning. This was amazing! Someone other than me or Stinky had finally mentioned something about a cover-up.
“Nita …,” I pleaded, “I can’t understand what you’re saying. What do you mean ‘cover-up’? Can you say that last part over again?”
And then the only full sentence to come through during the entire “conversation” screeched out of the computer, crystal-clear.
“Mom and Dad are in on the sabotage.”
That took the breath right out of me. I sat there spluttering, not able to form words. She abruptly stopped talking and turned her head. I heard muffled shouting and saw the room fly around as Nita’s arms waved like they do when she gets really mad. I heard a distinct hair ball noise and then the screen went blank.
“Nita?” I nearly yelled into the microphone. “Nita?”
She was gone.
I sat back in my chair, my brain swimming. Sabotage? Mom and Dad? David Hazelwood on the Spirit?
From the hallway, Mom’s voice interrupted my racing thoughts. “Is everything all right in there, Mike? Were you just shouting something?”
I opened my door. “Just, uh, practicing my report, Mom.”
Mom talked over her shoulder as she walked to the kitchen. “Shouting is not proper form for public speaking, Mike. Now, come eat your breakfast and then we can call Gram and see if she’s found anything out about Nita.”
I felt my stomach knot up. With the Sojourner getting closer to the Fold, I wouldn’t be able to contact Nita anymore, even with the greatest hacking skills in the universe. And the peapod would be useless soon, so Stinky couldn’t help, either. If I was going to figure out what Nita was trying to tell me, I had to do it quickly. And if Mom and Dad were sabotaging this mission, or had sabotaged the last one … well, I was going to have to figure out what was going on without their help.
I was anxious the whole time we were in the Family Room. Mom talked to Gram for only a few minutes, but I felt my face flushing the entire time. I knew I should tell them that I’d found Nita, but she had said so many unsettling things. I just wanted to sit down with my handheld and look at my scribbles.
“Right, Mike?” Mom was looking at me expectantly.
“Huh?”
“It’s okay if Dad walks you to class, right?”
“What? Why?”
Dad didn’t say anything. He just opened the door to the Family Room and motione
d for me to go out first.
I stood up from the couch and said, “So that’s it? Gram had no news?”
Mom sighed. “I just told you, Mike. The task force is still investigating.”
“Come on, kiddo,” Dad said, his expression softening. “Let’s get you to class.”
Mom grabbed me in a hug and I guiltily hugged her back. Then I picked up my bag and headed out the door with Dad right behind me. We walked to my classroom in silence. I needed to talk to Stinky about Nita … but it didn’t look like I was going to get that chance. I’d tried the going-to-the-bathroom thing too many times lately and Mrs. Halebopp was only letting me go during lunchtime now. She knew I was up to something. I was pretty sure she could somehow read my mind.
And then there was my report. With all of the other researching and hacking I’d been doing, I’d practically forgotten all about it. Now it was due at the end of the week and I was going to have to really hustle. Not only that, but the detention from ages ago that I’d never served was happening after class today.
“Have a good day, Mike,” Dad said. We were standing in front of the classroom door. It was open. Larc was inside staring at me.
The area around us darkened from the tower of Mrs. Halebopp’s hair blocking out the artificial light. She cleared her throat. “Mr. Stellar?”
Dad shook her outstretched claw.
“Has Michael informed you of his detention this afternoon? I’m afraid he may be late for dinner this evening.”
“Detention?” Dad asked, looking at me, his smile fading.
“It’s an old one,” I muttered. “Remember? From last week. Larc’ll be there, too.”
“I’ll see that young Mr. Stellar learns the value of good behavior if it takes a detention every evening,” Mrs. Halebopp said, mostly to herself, though her face was aimed at Dad’s.
Dad frowned. “Behave yourself today, okay?”
I sighed and walked into the classroom. As I took my seat, I saw Dad’s and Mrs. Halebopp’s heads bowed together. They were talking, and I didn’t like it.
Larc turned around in her seat and gave me a thoughtful look. “You look like a three-day-old burrito,” she said.
I made a face. “What does that even mean?”
“You look bad. Tired. Sad.”
“Well, much like a three-day-old burrito,” I said, riffing on her weird analogy, “I have noticed that things around here stink.”
“Well, it’s not me,” Larc said, shaking her head and trying to get a whiff of her hair.
I laughed. “No, I mean figuratively. Something fishy is going on.”
I tried to think of the best way to tell her what had happened this morning. I didn’t want to blurt it out in the middle of class. Mrs. H probably had bugs under all our desks. I decided to wait until detention. Mrs. H was pretty reliable about handing out manual-labor punishments. So if Larc and I had to swab the decks or e-file some papers, we might be able to quietly talk.
I leaned forward in my desk and carefully tapped Larc on the shoulder. “Do you think we can talk during detention?”
“Michael Stellar, are you asking me to the Sojourner Space Prom?” She turned and batted her icy eyes at me.
“What?” I spluttered. “There’s no … What in the world are you talking about?”
Mrs. Halebopp cleared her throat and looked at us menacingly. I sat back in my chair and Larc leaned forward in hers. Mrs. H walked to the front of the room to begin the day’s lesson. I could hardly concentrate on what she was saying. I just tapped my foot and waited for detention.
“Against my better judgment I’m letting you two serve your detentions together this afternoon.”
Mrs. Halebopp had her hands clasped behind her back and she was pacing. She shot us both a grimace. Her hair was teetering forward even more than usual and it looked like it was leading her down the aisle as she marched back and forth.
“I don’t want to hear any talking, see any smirks, or catch even a glimpse of either one of you turning around in your seats. You are to research your reports in silence. Communication is forbidden.”
I sighed. Great. No sweeping or filing. How were Larc and I supposed to talk?
Mrs. H continued. “I’ve turned on the wireless port. You should be able to access the Universal Network through the mainframe on the ship. There you’ll be granted access to the library’s reference section and you can work on your reports. Your password is your birthday. Now, Larc, honey, I want you to come sit over here.”
She motioned for Larc to take a seat at the other end of the classroom with her back facing me.
“Michael. You stay where you are.”
I nodded, feeling the world drop away. There was no way Larc and I could even try to talk now. Mrs. H unclasped her hands and smoothed her hair as she walked back to her desk. She swayed a little and it looked like she was collapsing under the weight of her hairdo. I snickered and she wheeled around like I’d jabbed her with a curlzapper.
“What was that, Mr. Stellar?”
“Oh, uh, nothing,” I mumbled, “just a, you know, tickle in my throat.”
“Well, I suggest you resolve your tickles right now. There is to be silence in this room.” She took her seat behind her desk and glared at me. I picked up my handheld and initiated my link with the mainframe. Then I had a brain wave. I tapped a couple of commands into the handheld and waited for a second.
“Link Failure.”
Dang, I thought. I tapped the screen and tried again.
“Link Failure.”
Come on….
I tapped out a few more commands and waited. I glanced over at Larc. I couldn’t figure out what she was doing. She was just sitting there. The only sound in the room was my tapping.
Finally a box popped up on my handheld screen.
“Act normal,” I typed.
“Took you long enough,” she wrote back. I smiled.
“I hacked the wireless port to connect our handhelds,” I wrote.
“Duh,” Larc wrote back.
“Take a look at these notes,” I tapped out as I quickly uploaded my scribbles to Larc’s handheld. “I talked to Nita this morning. Our connection was terrible. The things she said … Bad.” I hit Send and waited.
Larc took forever. With only ten minutes of detention left, I sent her a note to see if she had come up with any ideas. No response. I sent another note. Still no response. Then, finally, the familiar little white box popped onto the screen.
“This is not good.”
“What is not good?” I wrote back right away.
“David Hazelwood on the ship. Money-crazed Aurora. Sabotage. Your parents. Mike, this is bad.”
My shoulders slumped. I already knew it was bad. I was hoping Larc would see something different.
“It looks like my parents really did sabotage the first trip, doesn’t it?” I wrote as my stomach filled with lead.
“I thought she was talking about them sabotaging this trip.”
I sighed. Larc was confirming all my fears.
“I told you. Bad,” she wrote.
I just had such a hard time believing Mom and Dad were the bad guys. Yet Nita’s crackly voice kept running through my head.
Another message from Larc broke my concentration: “Are you OK?”
“Fine,” I typed back. “I’m just trying to figure out my next step.”
Knowing Larc, I expected to see a suggestion for my next step right away, but there was nothing.
I glanced up at Mrs. H. She was reading a book. I couldn’t quite make out its title, but the cover was a gaudy orange and red. It was funny to see her with an actual book in her hands. The only other person I knew who read old books anymore was Dad.
And then I saw it.
The title of the book, its gold lettering flashing in the fluorescent lighting, was anthology: the life works of e. e. cummings.
Suddenly Mrs. H looked up and caught me gawking. For a few seconds our eyes locked. I could hardly believe
it, but she almost seemed to smile at me. A moment later there was a buzz and the classroom intercom said, “Beatrice Halebopp, the ship administrator would like a quick word.” She closed her book with a thwap and set it on her desk.
Grumbling, she stood up. “Please stay in your seats. Do not move. Do not talk. Continue studying. I’ll be back in five minutes. And if you think I can’t see you while I’m gone, then you’re more naive than I thought.” With that, she walked briskly from the room. The door whooshed shut behind her and Larc and I were alone.
We sat there stunned for a few seconds before I whispered, “Go stand by the door, will you?”
Larc’s eyes widened. “She just said she could see us, Mike!” she whispered fiercely
“I’m calling her bluff,” I said. “Go stand by the door. Give me a whistle when you see her coming.” I jumped up and ran to Mrs. H’s desk. Larc hustled to stand by the door.
“How am I supposed to see anything? Door’s shut, brainiac.”
I ran and hit the button to open the door. It flew up and startled me. I still wasn’t used to doors that flew up instead of out. I dropped the stylus to my handheld in the doorway and whacked the button, closing the door. This left a tiny gap for Larc to peer through.
“Now get on your belly,” I ordered. “When you see those awful shoes clicking toward you, give me a signal.”
Larc looked annoyed at my bossiness, but she did what I asked. I ran back to the desk and grabbed the book. Frantically flipping through the pages, I felt my heart leap when I looked at the page numbers. The book started on page 212. Why would she have ripped out all those pages? I yanked the page from the frame out of my pocket. It had page number 259 on one side and 260 on the other. I flipped through Mrs. H’s book; 259 wasn’t missing. It was right there in the book. I flattened the page from my pocket onto Mrs. H’s desk and compared it to the page in the book. They were exactly alike. No changes that I could see at all.
Weird. Weird. Weird.
I flipped through the rest of the pages, but they all looked normal, too.
My heart stopped. Larc was waving her hand at me and chirping this strangled cuckoo cuckoo noise. I quickly flipped to the first page of the book, ripped it out, and stuffed it into my pocket. Larc was up on her feet and scrambling to her desk. We brushed by each other.