The Lifeline Signal Page 17

  “Mm-hmm.” Stefanos’ broad shoulders slowly lowered as he relaxed, but he said nothing more. The new man in the torn jeans, wrinkled black T-shirt, and fingerless gloves, by contrast, never stopped talking.

  “Of course, even if it was basically the end of the world as we know it, there’d still be no need to panic, because I’d still be here.” He flashed a grin and climbed up to sit on the metal railing for a better angle; his bare knees poked out of his jeans where they were nearly ripped to shreds.

  “Right, Jay. Then everything would be fine.” Stefanos glanced over at Annie and Shiloh, as if asking if they were hearing this, but held still and let Jay examine his hand.

  “What, you think the only superheroes are the ones who can fly and punch things really hard?” he snorted, pulling something out of a belt holster that resembled a small flashlight. He tapped it against one fist as he studied the damage and the object made a clinking noise against a metal stud in the knuckle of his gloves. “This looks like about a week’s buildup right here. Why didn’t you tell me? Even I can’t work miracles if I don’t know there’s a problem, hard as that is to believe.”

  Stefanos looked down at the much smaller man with something between exasperation and fondness. “Maybe because it comes with so much running commentary and self-congratulation.”

  “I congratulate myself when I do good work.” Jay stretched out his wiry arms, flexing his long fingers to release an obscenely loud series of cracks. Then he gave the cylinder he held a flick, and the end ignited into small violet flame. It was apparently a custom, handheld blowtorch. “And I always do good work.”

  “Did this happen a lot while I was gone?” Annie frowned, worry clouding her face as she watched Jay hold the flame to Stefanos’s metal hand. The big man kept his flesh and blood hand on Jay’s shoulder so he didn’t fall backwards and overboard, serenely looking into the sky toward the glowing trail. Shiloh was about to ask, but caught a flash of Stefanos’ golden eyes glinting, and realized they must do more than just see the standard naked-eye spectrum.

  “Depends on what you mean by ‘this.’” Stefanos smiled, voice steady, but Annie didn’t seem any more at ease. A tiny shower of sparks fell onto the deck, but she didn’t move. It looked like that was the last thing she wanted to do right now. “Corrosive air and mechanized parts don’t mix, we know this—but that doesn’t give me nearly as much trouble as Jay being a mother hen. I can take it from here.” Stefanos shook his head, but he was hiding a smile in his thick beard.

  “Fine, you go rest,” Jay said, shutting off the flame power. “That means sit down on something and don’t move, I don’t know if you’re familiar with that concept. Actually, I know you’re not, so you can start de-gunking your gears.” He pushed the goggles up onto his forehead, and Shiloh was again struck by the resemblance to xir mom. And the differences. They had similar long features, square chin, angular jaw. Their eyes moved in the same quick way; they both gestured and spoke with their hands. The biggest difference was that where Maureen tended to fix anyone she talked to with a piercing gaze that made them immediately shut up and listen, her younger brother looked like he was trying not to laugh. Jay had the same intense eyes and sharp focus, but always looked like he knew a secret. And it was a good one. He handed over the dormant blowtorch with a little flipping toss and flourish. “I’ll check on you in a little bit.”

  “When we find Danae, I’ll see if she can add a blowtorch extension to my next upgrade.” Stefanos flexed his synthetic fingers and the movements were smooth. “Along with the can opener.”

  “Good. Then maybe you can stop ‘forgetting’ to give mine back. Annie,” Jay hopped down off the railing and spread his arms wide, not missing a beat. “Get into my arms, now.”

  “Welcome home.” Stefanos gave Annie a smile as she complied. “You’re going to miss the quiet.”

  “No, I’m not,” she said in a soft voice, chin on Jay’s shoulder as he held her close. As Jay moved, Shiloh caught a glance at the back of his black T-shirt; it read BAD REPUTATION in white block letters in a way that looked very reminiscent of Annie’s jacket. Shiloh stole a glance to see if the text on hers had changed, and smiled when xie saw what it read. LOVE IS ALL AROUND. “Never stop talking to me, okay? Or them. I want to show Indra and Shiloh everything, and nobody’s gonna do it better.”

  “Shiloh?” Jay looked up after he and Annie parted. His eyes were wide and face slack, as if he’d truly been so hyperfocused on Stefanos’s hand, then Annie’s presence, that this was the first time he’d realized anyone else was here. Now that focus shifted onto xir. “I—I’m…” for the first time, Jay hesitated. For a few seconds all he could do was stare into Shiloh’s face, the mirrored lenses. But then, an open and honest happiness that spread across his face. “Really glad you’re here.”

  Shiloh figured that was an understatement, one that did nothing to encompass the complex and overwhelming wave of bittersweet emotion, loss, joy, relief, awkwardness, and feelings too big and important for too-small words. Shiloh studied his face right back, trying to match the living person to the still images at home and the faint childhood memories. It wasn’t hard, and Shiloh was oddly relieved. All this time, xie’d been worried xir uncle would be a stranger, but Jay’s animated face and bright eyes had so much of Maureen in them and so much kinetic energy, it was easy to forget any lingering anxiety. It was harder to form the right words. “It’s good to see you again too.”

  “I got so much to tell you, I don’t know where to start,” Jay said, sounding overwhelmed and excited and maybe a little scared all at once. Shiloh could empathize.

  “Jay--you know about Ash, right?” Annie cut in awkwardly. She stared at the ground instead of him.

  Shiloh froze, happiness dissolving so fast xie almost felt dizzy. Jay turned to fully face Annie, and for the first time, his smile vanished and his shoulders fell under the heavy weight of fatigue and grief. “Later. You gotta take five minutes to land and breathe. And don’t push Rowan, okay? They’re dealing with it in their own way. Everybody is.”

  “Mm-hmm.” She nodded, neutral-blank expression not changing a bit.

  “Anh Minh. Don’t beat yourself up. Nobody blames you.”

  “They’re taking it hard?” Annie whispered. She kept her eyes trained on Jay’s face as he forced the pain from it.

  “It’s not on you,” he said more firmly. “It’s just…I don’t think there’s an easy way to lose a brother.”

  “Annie, why don’t we go check on your friend?” Stefanos said in a low voice, resting his large, warm flesh and blood hand on her shoulder. “I’m sure the captain’s dropped him in the infirmary by now.”

  “Huh? Oh!” She still jumped a little despite his gentle tone. Once shaken out of her reverie, her eyes flicked down to his other hand and its corroded joints, then quickly away again. “Yeah. That’d be…okay.”

  “Don’t worry about this, it’s all under control, see?” Stefanos nimbly flexed his newly repaired hand in Annie’s direction. “Maybe then we can go tell Kari you’re here. She doesn’t come up for air much anymore but I know she’ll be happy you’re home.”

  “Yeah. I know I am.” Annie managed a smile as they headed to a door leading further into the depths of the ship. “Uh, I just got one thing to pick up from my bike first…”

  “Will he really be okay?” As xie followed Jay inside, Shiloh cast a concerned glance back toward the deck where Stefanos and Annie were heading off in the opposite direction.

  “Oh, yeah. We’re used to that,” Jay answered with an easy shrug and nod as he led the way down a tight, metal-floored hallway. With every new turn past doorways and corridors that appeared identical, Shiloh counted new ways to get lost. But Jay seemed to know exactly where he was going, because he moved with confidence, until he stopped, turning to face Shiloh. “I’ll have to go help in a minute, but right now, let me look at you.”

  “I’ve got so much to ask you,” he said, voice softening a little as he
took in everything about Shiloh he could see, starting with the usual hat and mirrored glasses. Probably wondering about the face and eyes behind them, like everybody did, even if he knew them better than most. “Damn. Sorry, almost forgot you came here for a reason. We’ll catch up later—you have it?”

  Shiloh hesitated, then nodded. Dug in xir pocket and pulled out the drive, rubbing the familiar shape between xir fingers. Xie’d done this so many times over the long journey it had become something like a worry stone, squeezing it like a stress ball and remembering that it wouldn’t be a good thing to accidentally break. Xie knew every molded corner and smooth plastic expanse and metal ridge, so much that xie was strangely sad to let it go. Still, it was one huge thing they’d come all this way for and it would help a lot more people in Jay’s hands than anyone else’s. Xie handed it over with a silent goodbye and mental thanks to xir mother for getting them this far. “Yeah. Mom said it’s for your eyes only.”

  “Mine are probably the only ones that could understand it.” In an instant the disk disappeared as fast as a card in one of Indra’s tricks in their dreams. Maybe it had actually gone up Jay’s sleeve. “That it?”

  “Oh!” Shiloh reached into xir opposite pocket and held up the thumb drive with Radiance’s logo on its side. “This is from Lakshanya Chandrasekhar. She wanted me to give this to you, it’s supposed to have a really important message from a contact on it.”

  “Huh,” Jay took it much less eagerly than he had the disk, holding it up and squinting at it as if it were either very valuable or potentially explosive. He reached up and slipped his thick goggles on, sliding a dial on one side and continuing to examine the thumb drive with an intent focus. Shiloh remembered looking for the hidden light-trail with xir own glasses, and the fact that Jay could see it too with the purple-lensed goggles. Xie wondered what else they let Jay see. “She…say… who’s it from?”

  “I don’t know. Just a contact.” Shiloh took a closer look at it too now, wondering if there was something unusual or important about it xie’d missed despite having it in xir pocket for the last thousand miles. “Is it okay?”

  “Huh?” Jay looked up quickly, as if surprised to see Shiloh, or anyone at all, with him in the corridor. “Oh, yeah, it’s fine! This is great, good, very good, uh, information.” He slid his goggles off again, and like the disc, the thumb drive disappeared along with his intense focus. “I gotta say, I’ll feel better once we’re moving again,” he said, easy smile and use of full sentences returning. “Our shields have been giving us hell. We’ve been cooling our heels here for a week waiting for a new one, and nobody likes being cut off from Parole.”

  “Cut off—so it’s not just us who couldn’t talk to you, you can’t talk to Parole either?

  “Kari’s working on it. And so am I. Together we got radio and internet covered and if we can’t do it, no one can.”

  “But no word yet.”

  “Right. So I guess that means no one can.” He shrugged, giving an almost-successful smile. “Relax. I’m sure they’re working hard on their end too. Nobody’s gonna leave us out here in the dark. In the meantime, I’ll get working on this. Maureen probably wrapped it up in a million layers of paranoid encryption. I sure would.” He was still grinning when he looked up from studying the device. “But there’s never been an encryption, firewall, or certain-doom scenario CyborJ couldn’t beat.”

  “Really, certain doom?” Shiloh couldn’t help the teasing note. Xie’d talked with xir uncle enough through encrypted messages and very rare video calls to get a sense for his talent of exaggeration. It was harder to tell when he was joking or not. Maureen liked to say that even Jay didn’t know for sure, but right now, he looked pretty serious to Shiloh.

  “Hey, Parole tried it a million times, then it tried one more time, just with murder, betrayal, and everything on fire—you know, that wasn’t already on fire—and look, here I still am, still kicking. You’d think they’d learn.”

  Shiloh stared at him for a few seconds, eyebrows raised and a slow smile spreading across xir face. “Sounds like you got some stories I haven’t heard.”

  “Yeah.” He nodded, smile fading into a grimace, as if he regretted that last round of bombastic confidence. “Please don’t ask me to tell them.”

  “Okay, no new stories,” Shiloh conceded, though it almost hurt to let that intriguing hint drop.

  “Probably for the best.” The smile Jay flashed wasn’t nearly enough to cover his exhaustion and Shiloh quickly realized xie’d made the right decision not to push the subject, no matter how xir curiosity burned. Xie had a feeling Jay had seen things xie couldn’t even guess at and wasn’t sure xie wanted to know. Probably enough actual burning to last a lifetime. "Got a bunch of oldies-but-goodies if you want those."

  “Sounds great. And I still want to catch up for real when you get the chance. Oh, and I know Indra will want to meet you when he feels better. I think he said he’d heard of you before.” Shiloh had to smile at the memory, even as xie felt a pang of worry, thinking of Indra in an infirmary somewhere in this huge ship and the burn-like wound on his arm. “He might even know some of your cooler stories already.”

  “Oh—yeah. Great.” Oddly, Jay looked startled by the suggestion, as if he’d never even considered it and, when he did, he didn’t find the idea altogether pleasant. When his smile came back it seemed strained. “Well, listen. You’re probably about to drop right there, huh? Well, one good thing about the ship being basically empty right now, tons of rooms to choose from.” He turned and headed down the corridor, motioning with his head for Shiloh to follow. “I’ll show you where to crash—on a bed, a lot better than the floor! Then I better get to work on these. Hey, how long do you think it’ll take me? A minute? Less?”

  Shaking off xir confusion, Shiloh hurried to catch up. Xie couldn’t help but wonder what had prompted the sudden change or even if xie had said something wrong already. But it was probably just the fatigue of the long day and longer trip and, by the time Shiloh caught up to xir uncle and his apparently happy monologuing, xir worries were forgotten.

  The moment Indra saw the infirmary doorway, he pointed himself directly toward the first bed he saw and fell right down, unable to take another step. He’d never been happier to see a bed, but after that he didn’t see much else. He’d been following the captain, or maybe she’d been steering him along, and he thought he heard her say something and hurry out but his feverish brain couldn’t understand the words. Then she must have come back in, because he heard rapid footsteps. But he also must have been sicker than he thought; they sounded like hooves against the metal floor.

  “…on. Have you feeling better soon.” It wasn’t the captain speaking. Or Annie, or Shiloh. A new voice. Hard to latch onto with all the rushing in his ears. He didn’t recognize the voice but held onto it like a lifeline while his head spun like leaves caught in a whirlpool. “Seen this before, you hold out for a while and then collapse all at once. Indra, can you hear me?”

  “I hear lots of things.” Even his own voice sounded like it was underwater or a million miles away. He almost laughed; the hoof noises were back. How could a horse be inside?

  “It’ll pass. Just keep breathing, in and out, nice and slow.”

  “‘Kay.” He let out a giggle at the clip-clops that accompanied the voice. Where was the horse? Maybe he could find it if he opened his eyes. He did and immediately regretted it. The room was spinning even worse than his head. Indra groaned and shut his eyes again.

  “These things come and go in waves. You’ll make it through this. Just keep breathing.”

  Waves. More like a tsunami. He had to be underwater because it was getting hard to breathe. He reached out, fumbling, until he touched something, a hand steadying him as he careened through a black void. It felt like the hand was pulling him up from the depths of the ocean. He sucked in a breath and held on.

  Slowly, the roiling chaos in his head ebbed. He let go of the hand, only now realizing how tight he’
d been clinging. He breathed deep, relieved to find that he could. It felt wonderful. So good he felt safe opening his eyes. He blinked up at the unfamiliar ceiling—metal, slightly curved, with recessed lights. It looked almost like the inside of a spaceship. Maybe he’d been abducted by aliens.

  “Feeling a little better now?” The voice was still here. Was the horse? Indra couldn’t see who was speaking laying down like this, so he raised his head a bit off the pillow.

  He immediately started to scream.

  “Are you all right? Where does it hurt?” The voice was still gentle despite sounding a good bit more alarmed. Indra was alarmed too, to say the least. Because now he could see where it was coming from.

  There was no horse. But there were hooves. They were the kind Indra couldn’t remember the name of, split into two parts, and bigger than he’d ever seen. They went up to a pair of furry reddish-gold legs that looked like they bent back the wrong way—then the person looked like a person, he thought wildly, except for the horns on the top of their head. Huge, spiraling things a good foot high and wide and, below them, ears that looked soft but not human. Their eyes didn’t look human either, they were completely black, like—no, not like the ghost eyes, those had been dull, matte, more like holes, these were shiny, just black all—

  He stopped screaming to take a breath.

  “I’m so sorry,” the more-than-slightly-demonic-looking person said quickly. “I promise, I’m not going to hurt you.”

  Indra stared, but silently. Partly because screaming made him feel even more lightheaded and partly because their voice that didn’t match his expectations at all. No hellish growling, didn’t sound like an old record being played backwards. It didn’t even sound like a forward-played death metal song, though the horns, hooves, and dark eyes would have made an amazing Satanic band mascot.