Haven 6

by Aubrie Dionne

  Striver shook his head, stomp­ing out the de­feat creep­ing in. “I don’t know. But I do know it’s the best way for you, for us.”

  “A leader must al­ways think of his people be­fore him­self. You know that.”

  “I’ve thought it over, and we must make the first steps to wel­come these people and unite our tribes. Be­sides, you are one of my people.” Striver squeezed her hand. “And I won’t let you waste away any longer. With Father gone, you’re all Weaver and I have left.”

  He knew Weaver was the soft spot that would get her to change her mind.

  “All right.” His mother clung to his hand, put­ting on a brave smile. “Let’s give this device a try.”

  Chapter Twenty-one

  A Great Catch

  Eri dug out a pack­age of soy­wafers from the bot­tom of a cracked sup­ply con­tainer. She held it in her fin­gers, feel­ing the hard, bumpy sur­face un­der­neath the pack­aging. Her mouth used to wa­ter with the feel­ing of the crink­ling wrap­per, but after eat­ing fresh, roas­ted boar meat, the snack seemed ar­ti­fi­cial and stale.

  “For people who shun tech­no­logy, they seemed to have saved a lot of our sup­plies.” Mars knelt on the floor­boards be­side her, rum­ma­ging through an­other con­tainer. The crude cot­ton tu­nic and green leg­gings muted her ag­gress­ive nature; she looked more like a forest gi­ant than a highly trained body­guard. Glan­cing down at her own blue tu­nic, Eri knew she shouldn’t judge. I look like an elf.

  “They weren’t go­ing to use it.” Eri dropped the un­eaten wafers be­side her and pushed back more dam­aged wires, look­ing for any­thing they could use as a weapon. “They didn’t want it fall­ing into the Law­less’s hands.”

  Mars nod­ded, pick­ing up Eri’s dis­carded soy­wafer. “Techno hoarders. That’s what I heard one of the Law­less call them.”

  “Yup. They sit on top of a ship that can still fly, hold­ing back secrets that would send Refuge into the in­dus­trial era.”

  “They’re afraid. Fear holds them back.” Mars split open the wrap­per, popped the whole thing in her mouth, and chewed. Eri wondered if she was hungry be­cause she lost her break­fast after the flight. Who knew the toughest mem­ber of the team was afraid of fly­ing? Mars didn’t let her fear hold her back, though, and Eri re­spec­ted her for con­front­ing it.

  “That’s how I got them to save you and Litus. I told them the Law­less have the rest of the laser guns.”

  Mars re­garded her with a raised eye­brow. “Good think­ing, Eri.” She wolfed down an­other soy­wafer and stared up at the thatched roof. “You know, at first you came off as a scared, self-doubt­ing gene-mutt, hid­ing in her work cell, un­able to con­front the is­sue of her birth. I thought you were a poor choice for the team, a weak link.”

  Eri looked down at a frayed wire, pulling on the ends. It hurt to have Mars ref­er­ence the teas­ing she’d en­dured her whole life. On the Her­it­age she’d felt like a second-class cit­izen. Here on Refuge, she’d made some­thing of her­self. She’d found the cour­age to save her team, to make friends with the nat­ives, and even to de­velop feel­ings for one of them, feel­ings that could pos­sibly lead to this mys­ter­i­ous thing called love. She wouldn’t have done any of this in her work cell, play­ing with words.

  Mars brought all that bag­gage up again. Bag­gage she’d rather leave be­hind. “I was a weak link. I star­ted be­liev­ing what people said in­stead of be­liev­ing in my­self.”

  “I wasn’t fin­ished.” Mars crumpled up the wrap­per and threw it into the con­tainer. “I’m glad the com­mander chose you. We were put to the test, and you were the strongest of all of us.” She stared at Eri, her chin twitch­ing like she still had trouble be­liev­ing it. “You saved my life.”

  “Don’t worry about it.” Eri waved it off. In­side, heal­ing warmth flowed through her. Never in a mil­lion years did she think she’d win Mars’s re­spect.

  The ferns rustled be­hind them and Eri turned. Striver stood in the door­way, mak­ing her heart speed. She hadn’t got­ten a chance to talk with him alone since the swamp, but her feel­ings had brewed.

  “Am I in­ter­rupt­ing?” He’d changed from his swamp clothes to a chest­nut-colored shirt, par­tially buttoned, re­veal­ing his smooth muscles un­der­neath. He’d washed his dark hair and pulled it back in a pony­tail so it glistened in the torch­light. One free white feather dangled from a string of beads, kiss­ing his tan neck.

  “Not at all.” Eri stood, want­ing to gush about how glad she was to see him. Thank good­ness Mars’s pres­ence stopped her from spout­ing any­thing em­bar­rass­ing. “Your people saved so much. Thank you.”

  “We did the best we could.” Striver came over, his mouth down­turned in a com­plic­ated frown. “There’s a fa­vor I need to ask you.”

  Eri gripped the wire hard in her hands, the end stick­ing into her palm. He’d done so much for her she couldn’t ima­gine say­ing no. How­ever, Mars knelt be­hind her and she had to be care­ful. Mars had a loc­ator as well and ac­cess to the com­mander. “Yes?”

  “My mother has been sick for some time. I wondered if you could try us­ing the same device on her that you used to heal Litus.”

  Use tech­no­logy? Had Eri heard him cor­rectly?

  He stared, wait­ing for an an­swer.

  She nod­ded so hard, curls fell in front of her face. “Of course I can.” This was her chance to show Striver tech­no­logy could be used for good. She couldn’t be­lieve he’d al­low it after all he rep­res­en­ted. He loves his mother more than their silly ideals. He must trust Eri. Did that mean she could trust him?

  Striver breathed in deeply in re­lief. “Thank you.”

  See­ing his vul­ner­ab­il­ity brought a surge of com­pas­sion and some­thing deeper, a yearn­ing to make him happy, to ful­fill his de­sires. Her whole body grav­it­ated for­ward, lean­ing to him.

  For­get Mars. She slipped her hand in his. His cal­loused fin­gers grazed her palm, tingling her skin as they wrapped around her fin­gers. He brought his fore­head to hers, his breath on her lips. “Tell me you can save her.”

  She trembled all over, want­ing to make everything right in his world. “I’ll try.”

  …

  Switch­ing off her locater to keep Com­mander Grier from in­ter­rupt­ing, Eri fol­lowed Striver to the same cluster of huts where she’d woken up after the battle. That whole morn­ing had seemed like a blur, but Eri re­membered Nu­tura’s kind nature and how she reached for Striver’s help as Eri left.

  Clutch­ing the re­gen­er­ator in her hands, Eri hoped more than any­thing she could heal her. “How long has your mother ex­per­i­enced symp­toms?”

  Striver turned back to her, con­cern etched in the per­fect angles of his face. “A year. Maybe longer. She tries to hide her pain be­cause she knows how much it makes me worry.”

  They reached the rope bridge and Eri clung to the rail­ing, try­ing not to look down. “How does your father feel about us us­ing the re­gen­er­ator?”

  Striver stopped, the bridge creak­ing un­der his feet as it swung with their weight. A furry black bird took off in the dis­tance, croon­ing. Striver waited for the bird’s calls to fade be­fore an­swer­ing. “He died a long time ago, when Weaver and I were young boys.”

  Pain seared through Eri’s chest. I shouldn’t have asked. “I’m sorry.”

  Striver shook his head. “It’s not your fault. My father took risks for the vil­lage: stay­ing out late to check on the wall, ex­plor­ing new ter­rit­ory for hunt­ing, chart­ing the re­gions in the moun­tains in the north. He’d leave for days and come back with an aw­ful rash or a broken leg. The Guard­i­ans couldn’t keep up with him.”

  “He sounds brave.” In fact, he sounds a lot like Striver.

  “He was.” Striver glanced up at the sky and smiled. “Too brave.”

  “What happened to him?”

  Strive
r paused, run­ning his fin­gers along the rope, his touch del­ic­ate and tent­at­ive. “Don’t get me wrong—he wasn’t a fail­ure. He ac­com­plished many won­der­ful things for this vil­lage.” His face grew grim. “But one day he didn’t come back. The Guard­i­ans looked every­where for him, from the mead­ows to the moun­tains. They never found a trace.”

  His story ate a hole in Eri’s heart. She was honored he’d share such dif­fi­cult memor­ies with her, but she didn’t know how to re­act. No one dis­ap­peared on the Her­it­age. It was a simple mat­ter of buzz­ing their loc­ator. With all its beauty, Haven 6—or Refuge—was a per­il­ous world. She scanned the leaves flut­ter­ing in the breeze. The jungle seemed as though it could swal­low her whole. “Maybe he’s still out there?”

  Striver shook his head. “No. He loved us too much to not come back.” He stepped closer to her, his voice fall­ing to a whis­per. “I have my own sus­pi­cions. But I’ve never told any­one this be­fore. Not any­one.”

  Eri held her breath as Striver’s eyes nar­rowed and he spoke. “Some­times I won­der if he en­countered the same golden li­quid Soren did, the same li­quid that man fell into in the cave.”

  The strange sym­bols flashed in Eri’s mind, tan­tal­iz­ing her in a puzzle she was dy­ing to solve. That’s why Striver had wanted to stay. If only she’d had more time to de­cipher them. “He doesn’t sound like someone who would aban­don the present for the past, es­pe­cially with two young kids at home.”

  “No.” Striver swal­lowed as if a bit­ter taste swirled in his mouth. “He doesn’t.” He blinked and turned around. “Come. I don’t want my mother to suf­fer any longer than she already has.”

  “Of course.” Feel­ing all shivery from the mys­tery of the li­quid and guilty about bring­ing up the past, Eri fol­lowed him across the bridge and into the hut.

  The room smelled of sweet blos­soms, fresh ferns, and cooked meat. Bell-shaped flowers dec­or­ated the floor. Are they all from Striver? A table stood in the cen­ter with a mug of wa­ter and pieces of smoked boar. Striver’s mom lay in her bed, barely mak­ing an im­pres­sion in the fern mat­tress.

  Can I really save this wo­man? Or am I giv­ing them both false hope? Eri shook off her doubts. She needed to fo­cus to use the device ef­fect­ively.

  Nu­tura gazed up at Eri with amuse­ment on her face. “So, Erid­ani Smith, how do you like our world?”

  “It’s beau­ti­ful.” Eri stood over her, tak­ing her hand. “Scary, but beau­ti­ful.”

  “Yes, like a great many things in this uni­verse.” Nu­tura pat­ted her hand. “Thank you for help­ing me.”

  “It’s the least I can do after what Striver did for my people and me.”

  Her eyes twinkled. “My son is a great catch, isn’t he?”

  Eri lost her count on the pulse. Great catch? What does she mean by that?

  Striver ran a hand over his hair, look­ing frazzled. “Now’s not the time for chitchat, Mother. Eri’s brought the re­gen­er­ator.”

  “The device that’s sup­posed to heal me?” She didn’t look very hope­ful.

  Eri squeezed her hand. “That’s right.”

  Nu­tura chuckled. “Guess it can’t make me feel any worse.”

  “Mother.” Striver gave her a stern look.

  Nu­tura smiled and turned her head to Eri. “Do your best.” She winked and tossed off her sheets, show­ing a bony body un­der­neath a thin un­der­dress.

  Eri’s heart skipped when she saw how skinny the wo­man was. She nod­ded, try­ing to keep a stoic face, and flipped up the lid. “Close your eyes and re­lax. You’ll feel warmth, but noth­ing more. Most people fall asleep.”

  READY TO SCAN SUB­JECT.

  Yeah, as ready as I’ll ever be.

  Eri glanced at Striver and he nod­ded his ap­proval. The hope mingled with worry in the lines of his face gave her all the cour­age she needed to start the scan. The device il­lu­min­ated the small room in sap­phire light.

  Minutes passed with si­lence ex­cept for the crack­ling of the torches on the walls. Nu­tura slept soundly as the scan fin­ished. Eri read the res­ults, her chest aching.

  Striver came up be­side her but he didn’t look at the screen. In­stead he looked dir­ectly into her gaze. “What is it?”

  Her tongue numbed un­til she could hardly speak. “Tu­mors. Can­cer­ous. Spread­ing through her body.”

  He winced as if she stuck him with a knife. “Can you fix it?”

  “I’m not sure. We never let such a thing get to this stage on the Her­it­age.”

  He balled up his fists and Eri put a hand on his arm. “I’m go­ing to try.”

  Hold­ing the re­gen­er­ator in both hands, she set the scan to op­timal power. The device buzzed un­der her fin­ger­tips as the green light traveled from Nu­tura’s head to her toes. She re­peated the pro­cess over and over un­til the re­gen­er­ator grew hot as fire in her hands and the muscles in her arms shook from hold­ing it steady. The en­ergy cell read low, but Eri pressed the scan­ner but­ton down with all her force. The heat traveled up her arms un­til drips of sweat rolled down her cheeks. The reek of burn­ing plastic filled the room.

  IN­SUF­FI­CIENT CELL RE­GEN­ER­A­TION.

  Eri pressed harder. In­suf­fi­cient, my cy­ber butt.

  The light weakened to a sickly pas­tel green, flick­er­ing out as the en­ergy cell de­pleted. Eri shook the re­gen­er­ator in her hands un­til the light came back on. The device beeped, the sound loud and for­eign in such a dark and primal hut.

  SCAN COM­PLETE. CELLS RE­STORED.

  The heat faded as the re­gen­er­ator buzzed off.

  Eri dropped the device and it hit the floor with a thud. Dizzy from con­cen­tra­tion, she fell back­ward and Striver caught her in his arms.

  “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.” Eri breathed deeply as Nu­tura shif­ted un­der the blankets.

  His voice was hushed, his words hes­it­ant. “Did it work?”

  Eri forced the hope down be­fore it got out of con­trol. “I think so, but I’m not sure.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  Striver held onto her like they were the last two people in the world. She melted into his em­brace, draw­ing on his strength. “We wake her.”

  He re­leased her and they ap­proached the side of the bed. Eri was hes­it­ant to touch Nu­tura, so Striver bent down and whispered over her ear. “Mother, wake up.”

  Her eye­lids fluttered and she rolled away, her back fa­cing them, bones pro­trud­ing from the night­dress.

  Eri tried to ease his wor­ries. “Sleep is a byproduct of the heal­ing pro­cess. She’ll feel weak and leth­ar­gic for the next few days.”

  Striver shook her shoulder gently, pulling her to­ward them. She groaned and rubbed her eyes. “Is it morn­ing already?”

  “No, Mother. Eri used her re­gen­er­ator to heal you, re­mem­ber?”

  Nu­tura blinked as if she saw them for the first time. “I re­mem­ber. It seemed so long ago.”

  “We just fin­ished.” Eri swal­lowed, not sure if she wanted to hear her an­swer to the ques­tion rest­ing on her tongue. “How do you feel?”

  Nu­tura scrunched up her eye­brows and wiggled her toes. She prod­ded her stom­ach with her fin­ger, trav­el­ing from her na­vel to her chest. She shook her head, and Eri’s hopes fell through the floor.

  “No?” Eri’s voice cracked.

  Nu­tura smiled, and her eyes twinkled. “No pain.” Her voice was in­cred­u­lous.

  Eri’s emo­tions did a one-eighty. Her heart al­most burst. “You sure?”

  “Cer­tain of it. In fact, my joints move much easier now.” She bent her legs and sat up. “I haven’t felt this good in ages.”

  Striver col­lapsed to the floor, tears wa­ter­ing his eyes.

  Eri dropped be­side him, tak­ing his hand. Had she done some­thing wrong? “What’s the mat­ter?”
/>   He glanced up and shook his head like he couldn’t be­lieve it. “All this time we’ve shunned tech­no­logy. Think of all the people we could have saved.”

  Guilt crushed down on her. Eri wanted to prove tech­no­logy’s worth, but she didn’t want to give him re­grets. She put a com­fort­ing hand on his arm. “You were fol­low­ing the rules set up by your an­cest­ors. It’s not your fault.” Thoughts of the Law­less flittered through her mind. “Be­sides, you could be right about people. They may not learn to con­trol it.”

  He traced his fin­gers along the back of her palm. “After what you’ve shown me here, we have to try.”

  “Blend­ing our cul­tures may be the only way to co­ex­ist on Refuge.” Eri hoped Litus’s talk with the com­mander had gone well. Maybe Com­mander Grier would spare Striver’s vil­lage. They provided a new pool of DNA and know­ledge of the planet. If any­thing, she could con­tact the com­mander again and try to per­suade her her­self.

  Striver’s hand traveled up her arm to the back of her neck. “Eri, you’ve shown me so much. You’ve rocked my world.”

  Eri blushed, feel­ing self-con­scious and tingly all over. Rocked his world? What does that even mean? “All I did was press a but­ton. A child could have op­er­ated that ma­chine. That’s the mir­acle of tech­no­logy.”

  Wip­ing his eyes, he smiled for what Eri sus­pec­ted was the first time since they got back to his vil­lage. “No. I saw you hold onto that thing even though it looked about to ex­plode in your hands. You didn’t give up, Eri. You’re the mir­acle.”

  Drums erup­ted be­low them, fol­lowed by shouts and laughter. Nu­tura’s fern bed rustled as she sat up. Striver pulled his hand away as if he real­ized they weren’t alone. Eri turned to Nu­tura with em­bar­rass­ment flam­ing in her cheeks.

  Nu­tura didn’t seem to no­tice their at­ten­tions. She scanned the room. “Find my good tu­nic. The cel­eb­ra­tion has be­gun, and I’m go­ing out­side to see it.”

  Striver stood, of­fer­ing his hand to Eri to help her up. “Fi­nally, we have some­thing to cel­eb­rate.”