Their Fractured Light: A Starbound Novel

by Amie Kaufman

  You must stay hidden, says the blue-eyed man. By keeping this planet young, we will stay quiet. No one will think to look for us. But there is darkness here, too, like there was in the last place. The fear follows us. This species is angry, always angry, and we are not curious about it anymore. We wish to go home. We wish to end this test.

  But there were dreams.

  THE MAG-LIFT DOORS OPEN on the slums with an assault of warm, moist air that tosses my hair back from my face. I try not to wrinkle my nose as the smells of pollution and street food mingle in my sinuses, but my stomach roils in spite of my best efforts. It’s nothing like the dry, odorless, many-times-scrubbed air in my penthouse, or even the earthy peat of Avon’s swamps. It smells like people here. Like many, many people all crammed in together in a space much too small to hold even half of them.

  Beside me, Gideon raises his head, and my eyes pick out a nearly imperceptible lift at the corner of his mouth. To him, this is home.

  I suppose if you grew up in a place like this, it wouldn’t seem so bad. Maybe the constant noise—the din from vendors hawking their wares, billboards playing their looped ads overhead, the kaleidoscope of pedal-bikes, foot traffic, police sirens, freight drones—would be comforting. But I’m used to the soft, quiet nights wrapped in Avon’s mist, and the first two months I spent on Corinth, here in the undercity, weren’t enough for me to get used to the noise. But if this was all you knew, growing up…

  Assuming Gideon grew up here at all. At Kristina’s place he handled the SmartWaiter like he was used to top-of-the-line appliances, and when I wasn’t looking, he unerringly picked out the most expensive luxury item in the whole apartment—the Miske artwork. He might navigate his way through the crowds with the ease of a native, but then, so do I. Two months was enough to learn that much. Still, we all came from somewhere, and what matters to me now is that he can keep himself safe—keep us safe—down here. And keeping my eyes on the back of his neck so I don’t lose him in the crowd, I have to admit that it’s nice to see him relax a little.

  The whole way down in the mag-lift elevator he didn’t say a word, pretending instead to check a small, handheld device that looked a little like a palm pad. I could tell he was pretending by the far too even rate at which he was scrolling through it, his thumb moving up and down across the screen like clockwork. I can see the truth in his tense shoulders, despite the casual way he slumped back against the lift wall, in the normally amused mouth pressed a little too thin, in the hazel eyes stopping just short of lifting to meet my gaze.

  We make a quick detour so Gideon can buy me a pair of cheap shoes—walking barefoot around the undercity is a recipe for getting any number of nameless diseases. But the detour is more than that—he doesn’t want to bring me to “his place.” That much is clear. I don’t know if he’d have even offered if I hadn’t lost it after we made it out of the elevator shaft. It wasn’t hard to find those tears—in fact, it was disturbingly easy, given how hard I was shaking and how tight a hold the panic had on me—but that just made them seem more real.

  I knew I had him, outside the elevator shaft, when I felt his arms go around me. Half sprawled on the hallway floor, my cheek fit against the dip just below his shoulder. We fit. Like those pendants they sell in gift shops that form a whole yin-yang symbol when you put them together.

  I take a quick, deep breath in through my nose, grimacing at the bright patchwork of smells. Those necklaces are just cheap plastene and flaky paint. They fall apart almost as fast as the friendships they’re supposed to symbolize. Focus. Just because the act is easy to pull off doesn’t mean it’s not an act.

  “It’s just up here,” Gideon calls over his shoulder, his voice jerking me back to the present just in time for me to skip sideways out of the path of a particularly single-minded cyclist, bike laden with plastene jugs of homemade sake.

  My stomach rumbles again, though this time it’s in response to the faintest whiff of something savory and tart—I crane my neck, but all I can see is a falafel cart half a block back. Still, somewhere, someone’s cooking noodles. For an instant, I can smell soy and garlic and lime. Then Gideon’s reaching out to tug me down a side street, and all I can smell is the wet garbage and old food wrappers littering the gutters.

  There are no street signs or helpful maps down here like there are up above. That, combined with shoddy palm pad reception, means that if you don’t know where you’re going already, you’re probably going to end up lost inside a minute. I’m trying to mentally log every turn, but it’s easier for me to memorize routes from a bird’s-eye perspective—with a map or a model, I could learn this whole sector in a few days. Here, muck splashing my shoes and noise everywhere and lanterns tossing in the breeze from air traffic overhead, I’m struggling.

  It’s not until I see the falafel cart again—on the other side of the street this time—that I realize why. He’s trying to get me lost. He’s trying to make sure I can’t find my way back here. My chest gets tighter with every step we take.

  It’s almost midday before Gideon finally stops at a faded green door, paint peeling and half-papered with disintegrating flyers too old to read. There’s no number on it, though as I scan the building’s façade through my eyelashes, I do spot a tiny camera, no bigger than a tube of lipstick, nestled against the fire escape. That’s enough to tell me it’s got to be Gideon’s place.

  He pulls out an antiquated key ring sporting an actual metal key, which he fits into the lock after glancing at me with one of his cocky grins. There’s not even a deadbolt. I’m opening my mouth to protest, to point out that this is hardly any safer than my penthouse—at least I could set up an alert on the elevator there—when he ushers me into a foyer little larger than one of the info booths up topside.

  The wall is lined with mailboxes, though to judge from the dirt and dust in the corners no one’s lived in this building—except Gideon, I guess—for years. Sometimes, sealed behind doors like this, whole buildings get forgotten. Gideon reaches for one of the boxes and presses his fingers against the number panel—and the whole thing goes in with a click. The mailbox façade opens outward to reveal an optical scanner and three different keypads. No wonder it looks like a low-rent tenement on the outside—with the kind of security Gideon’s got, it’d be a big flashing neon sign to anyone with eyes that someone important lived here. Or someone with something important to hide.

  He presses his thumb to one of the keypads—it’s a print scanner in disguise—and then leans down for the camera to scan his retina. “Honey, I’m home,” he murmurs. Voice recognition? Or just Gideon being Gideon? He keys in a numeric code on one of the other keypads, quickly enough that I struggle to follow it, but he doesn’t bother to hide the code from me. After all, unless I had his thumb and his eyeball—and possibly his vocal cords—I wouldn’t be able to get in without an invitation.

  After a cheery beep of acceptance, the whole wall clanks and shifts. Gideon shoves his shoulder against it and it swings back to reveal a metal staircase leading down, dim lights flickering to life. “After you.”

  “Lovely,” I reply, hiding my genuine uneasiness with sarcasm. The staircase leads to a dark little cave of a room, sparsely furnished and dominated by a whole wall of screens on one side. The equipment and the chair, one of those tailor-made ergonomic things, are clearly the only things in the whole place he’s bothered to spend money on, and the red and blue rug on the floor is the solitary homey touch in the whole place. The bed in the corner is little more than a cot with an ancient mattress slung across it. I sigh. “I suppose a secret palace down here was too much to hope for.”

  “I’m a man of simple needs,” he replies, voice airy and utterly unconcerned. He leaps down the last few steps to the cement floor, then slips past me to bend over his desk, eyes scanning his screens. A few of them he closes before I can see what he’s doing—others are filled with coded gibberish that means nothing to me. The rest seem to be chat feeds and crackpot conspiracy sites. I guess eve
ryone’s got some guilty pleasure tucked away.

  There’s nowhere to sit except the computer chair, so I sink down gingerly on the edge of the sagging mattress. For all its age, it does seem to be relatively clean, at least. The other side of the room is empty, but the ceiling is full of fold-down equipment. I recognize a chin-up bar and some ropes. “So this is where you practice for climbing elevator shafts?” I ask, keeping my voice light—still trying to regain my balance with him.

  The corner of Gideon’s mouth lifts as he turns away from the computer screens. “Nah, just vanity, really. Takes a lot of work to be the peak of physical perfection, you know.”

  “I’d pretend to believe you, but you clearly don’t have girls over very often.” Threadbare mattress and tatty rug over a cold cement floor, case in point.

  “You caught me,” he says, inspecting his den as though he’s never seen it before. “A lot of my best targets are isolated. No connections in or out from the servers, no chance of a remote hack. You have to pay a house call, if you want to know what’s in there, and that means climbing, sometimes.”

  “So you break and enter as well.”

  “Well, once you’ve got started, a little trespassing is the least of your problems. I only do elevator shafts on special occasions though, Dimples. They’re tough.”

  “I like to talk my way in rather than break my way in.”

  Gideon grins at me, but I can spot a hint of that same tension he wore in the mag-lift down to the slums. “Bet you wish you’d asked for more detail before you talked your way in here. If I’d known you were coming, I’d have gotten curtains or something.” Despite the total lack of windows in his underground den. His eyes meet mine, the easy arrogance stilling for just a moment, becoming thoughtful, measured. “You didn’t give me a lot of warning.”

  I swallow, my gaze sliding away from his. “How did you find me?”

  “Got your message, tapped into the security feed at your place.” He drops down into his chair, easing back as the whole thing folds around him, adapting itself to the shape of his body. “I tracked you from there.”

  “The security—” Abruptly, all I can think of is that I stripped naked in the middle of my living room while those men made me change there—and the security camera’s in the middle of the ceiling. “You could see the camera feed from my apartment?”

  Gideon laughs, not doing much to calm the sudden flush burning across my face. “Don’t worry, Dimples. If I want to see you with your clothes off, I’ll do it the old-fashioned way.”

  I roll my eyes, suddenly very aware that I’m sitting on his bed. But getting up now would be telling, so I stay where I am. “Fine. Look, I’m grateful you came to get me. Just not that grateful. My clothes are staying where they are.”

  Gideon laughs again, though more softly this time, the sound punctuated by the creak of his chair as he leans forward to rest his elbows on his knees. “Whatever you say, Dimples.”

  The not-so-subtle reminder that he still doesn’t know my first name makes me long to scratch at the skin-patch covering my genetag. I take a slow, quiet breath in and out, my eyes flicking toward the screens. In the background of one, I can see a search function running—I can’t tell from here what he’s looking for, but I can see it combing the hypernet for information, gathering data here and there, collating it for easy digestion. My skin crawls, the itchiness on my forearm suddenly overpowering.

  What the hell am I doing getting involved with a hacker, of all people? I should just cut and run the next time he opens that vault of a front door. When I first came to Corinth, stepping off a free ride all the way from Ivanoff Orbital Station, I’d thought I was capable of charming anyone I met into doing anything I needed.

  But my first attempt at a con here cost me nearly half my hard-earned savings, and left me on the run from a guy called Thor. For weeks it was two steps forward, one step back. I took whatever I could find, whatever I could get, until I built trust with my first contacts, then used them as stepping-stones to the next.

  Starting from scratch, building my contacts all over again—it’ll take months. Months I may not have, now that LaRoux Industries is on to me.

  It was bad enough when they just thought I could hand them the Knave—now they know for sure I’ve seen the rift, and what it can do. And that’s enough to keep them chasing me across the galaxy. I have to find some way to get to LaRoux faster. Before he can get to me.

  Maybe a hacker is exactly what I need.

  “Look,” I say softly, keeping my eyes on the floor, lashes lowered. “I want to trust you, Gideon.” I let him hear the longing there—easy enough because it’s true. But wanting and doing are two very, very different things. “You saved my life back there. And I—I like you.”

  “Uh-huh.” His voice is flat, dry—skeptical. Nothing like the soft murmur up on the roof.

  Okay, that’s not going to work. Regroup. I’ll have to show him a few of my cards if I’m going to get to see his hand. Two parts truth, one part lie.

  “I mean it.” I look up through my lashes, then lift my chin as if defying him to disbelieve me. “You know I’m a liar, you know I con people—you’re not stupid. It’s been a really, really long time since I had anyone I could trust.”

  Truth.

  Gideon’s eyes meet mine, then skitter away toward the far wall. His body language is obscured by the chair, but his face, at least, looks conflicted. “Me, too.”

  “Maybe we can help each other, then. I need information about my father’s death, information LaRoux Industries has somewhere. And you’re after something there too, or you wouldn’t have been at their headquarters that day.”

  Truth.

  He doesn’t reply this time, but I can see him thinking. He wants to trust me. A good mark always wants to trust you—a good mark wants you to con him. The audience wants you to succeed. I just have to not screw it up.

  I swallow hard. “All I want is to find the truth about what happened to my father.”

  Lie.

  “LaRoux Industries is dangerous, Dimples,” Gideon says in that slow drawl of his. “Maybe you’d be better off just leaving Corinth, changing your name again, disappearing.”

  I fight not to grit my teeth. I don’t need to be told about danger. I’m a daughter of Avon—I’ve lived in the shadow of what LaRoux Industries can do almost my entire life. I’ve watched my only family destroyed by the Fury LaRoux created. I was the one back there about to have my mind wiped cleaner than one of Gideon’s data drives. And I don’t exactly imagine myself slipping away after murdering Roderick LaRoux to an easy life—my goal’s a one-way ticket. Though, of course, Gideon doesn’t know that. And no reason for him to know.

  Instead of snapping, I blink at him, then lean forward so that the anger in my voice will sound like passion. “If they were responsible for the death of someone you loved, would you be satisfied just disappearing?”

  He’s silent for a long time, so long I start to wonder if maybe he could tell I was angry after all. Then he lets his breath out audibly and gives an almost imperceptible nod. “All right,” he says softly. “Maybe we can help each other.”

  I almost give my own sigh of relief. “Just promise me one thing?”

  Gideon lifts an eyebrow, some of that amusement returning to his gaze. “Already with the demands and we’re not even through our second date.”

  “Don’t tell the Knave about me.” I indicate his computer screens and their endless data streaming in and out with a flick of my eyes. “Please. I’ve survived this long by keeping to myself, and working with an ally will be hard enough. I just…I’m on your side. So long as it’s just your side. Can you do that?”

  Both his brows go up this time, and he hesitates. “I won’t tell anyone about you,” he replies eventually.

  I can’t help but let my breath out, and it emerges shakier than I’d like. My palms feel hot where they’re pressed against my thighs. A good actress feels some of what she emotes, but I need to
get a grip. I shouldn’t care whether he trusts me or not, just whether he gets me where I need to go.

  He’s watching me with his usual air of indolent charm, though now I can see the shrewdness behind the lazy grin. For a wild, insane moment I want to blurt out the truth—I want to tell him everything. I choke it down. Walk carefully, Sofia.

  I lift my chin again, this time so I can meet his eyes. “Then I might as well tell you…Sofia. My name’s Sofia.” Truth. “God, I can’t remember the last time I gave someone my real name.” Truth. “So…no more secrets.”

  Lie.

  Time is a disease this species has created, and as their captives, time infects us as well. The symptoms are impatience, and boredom, and madness, and despair. And worst of all: understanding. These creatures cannot see into each other as we can, and therefore they know each other only through the words they invent. And words breed untruth.

  And the blue-eyed man has been lying to us.

  SOFIA. THE NAME SUITS HER. It’s graceful, like it might slip away between my fingers, leaving no trace it was ever there.

  “No more secrets,” I echo, though I know it can’t be a promise of my own. I can see it right there for an instant—how much more there is in that space between us, how much more we could both say. But right as I can feel myself on the edge of doing something stupid, she sighs, scooting back on the bed so she can lean her head against the wall, breaking the moment. I let it go.

  “Do you have anything to eat down here?” she asks, toeing off the shoes I snagged for her, so she can draw her knees in against her chest and close her eyes.

  “I don’t think it’s going to suit your palate,” I warn her, pushing to my feet and reaching up into the rafters for the locker where I’m pretty sure I stuffed my snacks.