“He didn’t give me a chance,” I muttered.
“That’s a cheap shot and you know it,” Reyna snapped.
The rebuke was like a slap in the face. I looked away to hide my consternation as she went on. “This isn’t any easier for the khavi than it is for you. Talk to him. If you can’t do that, listen to him. He’s just as much a victim of the Flare as you are.” She rose to leave. “I expect to see you in uniform at morning briefing. No more hiding in your quarters. This is a ship in crisis, and there’s no room for passengers.”
As she left, I looked again at the alcove below, where Hathan’s outline was dimly visible through the sheer hanging. It had been one thing for Zey to insist on his brothers’ innocence. It meant something else coming from Reyna. She had no motivation to lie about how the Flare worked. If anything, the opposite was true. I wondered if she had just laid her career on the line by urging me to stay when her orders directed her to do the opposite. Why take the risk? We weren’t friends. I knew she saw the Ascendant as just another posting, more prestigious than some, more tedious than most. What did she care whether I stayed or went? I didn’t know what to make of her interference. I wanted to be angry with her, for second-guessing me and for dismissing my pain so callously, but I couldn’t. I owed her too much. She had saved my life, and when I had nearly tossed it away, she had saved it again, without a word of recrimination. She might not be my friend, but she had earned the right to speak to me like one. I would think about what she’d said. I might even talk to Hathan. Not tonight though. I didn’t think I owed her that much.
* * *
The next morning I presented myself at the briefing as ordered. I caught Reyna’s eye, and she lifted her chin in a reserved acknowledgment of my presence. I sat down next to Zey, who murmured a greeting but didn’t look up from his flexscreen until Saresh announced that transmissions from Earth and Vardesh Prime had arrived during the night.
“As expected, we’re being redirected to Elteni Starhaven for debriefing,” he began. “We should arrive in a little over three weeks. We’ll be quarantined in an outlying wing of the starhaven until the medical crew at Elteni clears us for entry. We should expect to be there for at least two weeks. Once we’ve been processed and cleared, anyone who wants to leave the Ascendant will be free to do so. The Echelon asks that anyone requesting a different posting do so as soon as possible. Novi Alkhat . . .” Saresh pressed his lips together, his eyes on his flexscreen, and I knew before he said them what his next words would be. “The Council and the Echelon are unanimous in their decision. Novi Alkhat is being recalled to Earth. The Council’s precise words were ‘unacceptable levels of physical and emotional trauma.’”
“So that’s it,” I said. “I’m not going to Vardesh Prime.”
Saresh said gently, “Not on this trip, I’m afraid.”
I didn’t hear anything he said after that. When the meeting was over, I stumbled back to my quarters, sat down on my bed, and put my head in my hands. I didn’t cry. I’d cried enough. After a while I lay down on my side and curled myself around the hollow ache in my chest. Why did I feel like this? I had already decided to leave the Ascendant. My mission was over. It had been over when Hathan knocked me to the floor, or even before that, when Saresh hurled himself at Zey. The shining path I had followed from California had ended somewhere behind us in the vast darkness between Arkhati and Vardesh Prime. I would never see another world. Never feel the pull of gravity on a new planet. The crystal spires of Khezendri, the Dream Forests of Veynir, the twin moons of Rikasa receded before my eyes into the realm of the imagined. I was nothing more than a parcel after all, something too delicate broken in transit, now to be taped up and shipped ignominiously home. I was a failure, and I was lonelier than I had ever been.
I lay on my bunk for the next few hours, drifting between sleep and a sort of listless, despairing trance. Reyna was going to be annoyed with me, I thought dully. I was shirking my novi duties. As if that mattered. Early in the afternoon my door chime sounded. I went to the door and opened it. Zey stood in the corridor outside. He was holding a large metal canister of the type used to store dry goods in the galley. I made a halfhearted joke. “Are you going to hit me with that?”
“What?” He looked down. “No. I made popcorn. I was hoping we could watch something. I’m supposed to be working with Ziral, but she cancelled. I don’t feel like being alone right now.”
“Me either,” I said. “But I don’t want to argue about the Flare.”
“Neither do I.”
“Okay.” I stepped back to let him in. “You made popcorn all by yourself?”
“Yeah. And it’s good. Not as good as Ahnir’s, but close.” He settled himself on the bed and nodded to my laptop. “What are we watching?”
“Galactic Drift. The crossover episodes.”
Galactic Drift was a second-tier spinoff of Divided by Stars. It took place in London, as opposed to the original’s California, which presumably explained Kylie’s fondness for it. It was one of the only Vardramas I’d found among her video files. A handful of early episodes featured drop-ins by major characters from the earlier and more popular show. Zey nodded and reached for the ‘play’ control. I sat down next to him, pulled my blanket up over us, and helped myself to a handful of popcorn.
It was, in a way, exactly like the last night on Arkhati, when I had crawled into Kylie’s bed to share her warmth. Zey and I were two animals breathing together in the tiny pocket of safety that was my room. Just that. I closed my eyes and let the various sounds wash over me: the predictable dialogue, the jokily pronounced musical cues, the occasional soft laugh from my best friend, the rustle of popcorn in the canister. Those noises were underpinned by another: the hum of the Ascendant’s engines as the ship sped onward into the dark. With my eyes closed, I could forget about Zey’s bruises and the brace on my own wrist. I could float on the surface of the moment, untethered to memory. I could choose not to think about what happened next.
We watched two episodes. After the second one, Zey paused the show, pushed the blanket back, and stood up. “I have to go.” He hesitated, then went on, “I know I said I didn’t want to fight with you, and I don’t. But I need to tell you something, as a friend. That’s what we are, right? Friends?”
“Of course,” I said, surprised.
“Then listen to me. You’re wrong about the Flare. And you’re wrong about Hathan. I know you don’t know him well. But you know me, and I’m telling you the person you saw that day wasn’t him. Remember what happened on the Pinion? He was wrong about you, right? And I kept trying to tell him, and he wouldn’t listen. I won’t let that happen again.” He took a deep breath. “I’m right, and friends trust each other. So you should trust me.”
“I do,” I said.
“But you don’t believe me.”
“No.”
He asked, more curious than angry, “Why not?”
“I . . . I can’t explain it. It’s just not enough.”
“Have you talked to Hathan about it? Given him a chance to defend himself, or at least tell you what it was like from his side?”
“No,” I admitted.
Zey stared at me from the doorway, frustration warring with sympathy in his face. At last he said, “Eyvri, you don’t get to pick. You can’t tell yourself that Saresh and Khiva didn’t mean it but Hathan did. That’s not fair to him. If you’ve decided to hate him for the Flare, then go ahead and hate him. But you have to hate the rest of us with him, because it could have been any one of us in that room with you. Even me.”
“You’re wrong,” I whispered.
“No,” he said quietly. “I’m not. I’m going to leave now. When you’re ready to talk about it again, let me know.”
He left. I sank down onto the bed and dragged the blanket over me again.
Zey’s popcorn had been delicious, but it was meager fuel for hibernation. Late in the afternoon hunger drove me to the mess hall. I made soup and a sandwich and brought
them on a tray to the lower-ranking table. Evening briefing had started a few minutes before, and I was certain of having the place to myself, but as I was finishing my meal, the door slid open to reveal Hathan. The sight of him triggered a lurch in my stomach that was half-excitement, half-fear. I wondered if the fear would fade with time. I would never know. We would part ways at Elteni, and I would never see him again.
He raised his hands slowly and waited for my reluctant nod before stepping inside. His first act was to fix the door in the open position. Marginally reassured, I turned back to my food. He went through to the galley and came back with two glasses of beer. He carried them to within a few paces of my table, stopped, and waited for me to look up before he asked, “Can I sit?”
My mouth was full, so in lieu of answering, I jerked my chin at the empty seat to my right. He placed the beers on the table and sat down. I took another bite and chewed methodically, glancing every so often at the open doorway. Leaving it open had been a symbolic rather than a practical choice. I knew how fast his kind could move. He would have trapped me in the conference room even with the door wide open.
“I left the briefing,” he said in response to my unspoken question. “I was planning to speak to you afterward, but when I saw that you weren’t there, I went looking for you.”
“You found me,” I said.
“I’m sorry about Vardesh Prime. I know how much that meant to you.”
I nodded.
“I’m not going to try to talk you out of leaving the Ascendant. I have no right to keep you here. I have no right to ask you to listen to me either, but I think you’ll want to hear what I have to say.”
I finished my sandwich and washed it down with a swallow of beer. “Say it.”
“Am I right in thinking that you don’t want to talk to me about the Flare because you don’t think talking will make any difference? You saw what you saw, and nothing I can say will convince you that that’s not who I am?”
“Pretty much.” I was aware that my curt answers, which would have been ungracious even in English, must be blatantly offensive to Vardeshi ears. I didn’t care. The only way I could keep him from hearing the tremor in my voice was to use it as little as possible.
Hathan said slowly, “What if I didn’t have to tell you? What if I could show you?”
“Show me? How?”
He didn’t say anything. I looked at him in puzzlement. He held my gaze, his eyebrows raised slightly, as if he were waiting for me to reach an obvious conclusion. I had, but it was too absurd to contemplate.
The silence grew protracted. Finally I forced myself to break it. “You can’t be serious.”
“I am.”
“A Listening?” I said incredulously. “That’s your idea?”
“It worked for you once. It could work again.”
I didn’t even hesitate. “Nope. Out of the question.”
“Because of what I did to you.”
“No, because—” I fumbled for a credible reason. “Because you’re not a Vox. There’s no way it would work, unless rana works on humans, and I’m not about to try it. In case you’ve forgotten, it’s a five-month trip to the nearest emergency room.”
“Of course not,” Hathan said swiftly. “I would never condone that. The drug is untested in humans. We have no idea what it would do to you. But Saresh thinks he might be able to serve as a conduit. A bridge between our minds. No rana needed on either side.”
“Saresh knows?”
“It was his idea.”
If Saresh had suggested it, I thought, it must mean he was confident that he would be able to screen my thoughts from Hathan. I asked the question anyway. “So would this be a two-way exchange, or . . .”
“No. You would see my memories. I wouldn’t see yours.”
If it failed, I thought, if Saresh overestimated his ability to control the flow of information, the consequences would be disastrous. But if it worked . . . If it worked, I would have what I had longed for in the months since discovering my feelings for Hathan but never imagined I would actually be granted: a glimpse into his thoughts. The idea was both heady and terrifying. What human suffering the pangs of unrequited love hadn’t at some time or other longed for a portal into the mind of his or her beloved? And didn’t most of us ultimately conclude that it was probably in our best interest that such knowledge was locked securely away? Some things were better left in darkness. I knew how cruelly revealing were the things people said about each other in unguarded moments. And those were just words. Thoughts were another matter entirely. I wasn’t at all sure I had the courage to see myself as Hathan saw me.
And yet, I argued with myself, what did I really have to lose? There could be nothing in his mind darker than what I had already seen. The Flare had spent whatever poison was there. And if I refused his offer, I would deny myself the chance to see the world through his eyes. He was proposing to share his memories with me. What I had done with Saresh hadn’t been nearly so intimate. I had sensed his presence, but he hadn’t let me into his thoughts. That I should be invited to do such a thing by any Vardeshi was remarkable. That the invitation should come from Hathan himself was extraordinary. And I would never have another chance like this one. I knew him well enough to know that, if rejected once, he would never offer again.
He was watching me. I’d been silent for too long. I needed to say something. I racked my brain for a suitably preoccupying objection and seized on the first one that came to mind. “Just so we’re clear, I’m not interested in reliving the Flare from your point of view. Once was more than enough. I can barely handle my own memories. I’m not about to throw yours into the mix.”
“I wasn’t thinking of the Flare. I had a different memory in mind.” He looked at me questioningly. When I nodded, he went on. “The night before we launched on the Ascendant, I met with Suvi Ekhran to discuss the crew. She asked me what I thought about you, and I told her. I was honest. I had no reason not to be. It was a private conversation, and it was in my interest to tell her what she needed to know. Let me show you my memory of that night. I think it will give you the proof you need.”
Skeptically I said, “And you’re willing to do that? To share that with me?”
“I wouldn’t be sitting here if I weren’t.”
“But why? The mission is over. I’m being sent home. Why does it matter what I think?”
He lifted one shoulder slightly. “Maybe it’s ego, but I don’t like the thought of you going back to Earth thinking the man you saw that day was the real me. I own my mistakes. I was wrong about you the first time, with Vekesh. But I’ve learned since then. I see humans differently now. I see you differently. And if there’s the slightest chance that I can prove that to you through a Listening, why not try?”
Put in those terms, it seemed eminently reasonable. A Listening was the logical solution to a thorny emotional problem. It would be personal for Hathan, but not deeply so. He was Vardeshi. The sharing of memories was a social practice for his people. And while it meant something more for a Vardeshi to engage in a Listening with a human, he could have no idea how much it would mean to me. Saresh did though. And Saresh had been the one to suggest it. I wondered what he thought I would see.
A thought struck me, and I asked, “Isn’t it against the rules though? I thought Listenings with humans were off limits now.”
Hathan looked pensive. “As to that, the Council and the Echelon can advise us, but they don’t control us. Ultimately we make our own choices. As the first human survivor of the Flare, you’ll be given broad latitude to determine what you need to recover. If you think a Listening will help, we should act now and worry about getting permission later. That being said, if we do it, I think we’d be well advised to keep it quiet for as long as we can.”
His flexscreen emitted a humming note, signaling an incoming high-priority message. He glanced at it. “The briefing just ended. We won’t have the mess hall to ourselves much longer. Will you consider—”
&n
bsp; “I’ll do it,” I said.
He looked taken aback. “You’re sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“If you need time to think—”
I cut him off again. “I said I’m sure. When can we do it?”
The part of me that had assumed he was bluffing all along expected him to put me off, but he said immediately, “Tonight, during the senek hour. In my quarters. I’ll tell Saresh.”
“I’ll be there.” I got up to clear my dishes away.
It was only later, when I was alone in my quarters again, that I recalled my long-ago promise to Zey never to participate in another Listening. I had been so certain then that I could keep my word. I had only agreed to the first Listening because of imminent danger to my life and the lives of my crewmates. I would never have risked my sanity for any circumstances less compelling. It had seemed impossible then that I might find myself in such a position twice. But I had reckoned without the Flare. And I hadn’t known that whatever inexplicable hold Hathan had over me would only grow stronger, even after my trust in him was shattered, until the need to validate his innocence loomed as large in my thoughts as life and death. He had invited me into his mind. I couldn’t refuse.
But it made me uneasy to think of Zey. It had wounded him deeply to learn that I had shared a connection with Saresh that was forever denied to him as a Blank. How would he feel when he discovered that I had shared that same connection with Hathan? It was a secret for now, but I knew better than to believe such things stayed hidden, particularly when the two others concerned were Zey’s brothers. Sooner or later, he would find out. The thought of hurting him again was almost enough to make me change my mind. I reached for my flexscreen more than once, a few keystrokes away from calling the whole thing off. But when the senek hour arrived, I found myself standing, just as I’d known I would, outside the door to Hathan’s quarters.
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