Colonization (4 page)

“It’s too bad we lost the last crop of green beans.” She threw in a dash of salt. “They would have added a nice touch.”

“It’s not your fault, Mom.” Mold had infested the seeds, contaminating the entire container. As the chief microbiologist, any mistake like that weighed heavily on her shoulders.

She sighed, slumping forward. “Our stocks are low, and a lot of the seedlings aren’t growing to full capacity.”

I poked the tomatoes on the countertop with a fork. They were smaller than my palm, with shriveled skin. Not too appetizing. Then again, I’d only seen healthy tomatoes in pictures from my history books of Old Earth.

“These look fine, Mom.”

“We’ll have much more to work with when we get to Paradise 21: new soil, new species.” Her face brightened while I frowned, turning back to the accumulating tomato paste. Was I the only one that didn’t want to land?

The wallscreen beeped behind us and flashed the words
Incoming Message
. Mom took up my job at the food congealizer. “Go see what it is, honey.”

I jogged into the family room and clicked on the main screen. As I read the words, I froze.
Life Assignments for Class Omega
.

Oh, no. When my grandpapa had announced they’d be speeding everything up at the meeting last night, I didn’t think it’d be the next day. My insides tightened and I felt sick and goose-bumpy all at once. Half of me wanted to run into my room and hide, and the other half yearned to get it over with and press the damn button.

The food congealizer paused. “What’s taking so long, Andromeda?”

“Nothing, Mom. I’ll be right back.”

I didn’t want to share this moment with anyone. I couldn’t handle the shame and humiliation of being assigned a less-than-adequate job and an ill-matched lifemate. I hoped I did better than I assumed on the tests, but I lived in denial of a lot of things.

They used to hand out the assignments on beautiful thick white paper, but that ran out two generations ago. Now all we had was a public screen available for everyone to see. I guess they figured we’d all know in a matter of days anyway. My mom wouldn’t stay in the kitchen forever, so I gathered up my last smidgen of courage and pressed the button.

A long list of names flashed up. After a moment of panic, I realized it was in alphabetical order and scrolled down to the Bs. Next to my name it read
Agriculture, Section 34a: New Species Integration.
Relief flooded over me like a cool shower. Having a job with mom wasn’t so bad. All those nights I’d listened to her complain about soil nutrients and growth cycles must have paid off. I was a much lower rank than she was, but I could always work my way up the system.

I scrolled down to see that Nova did indeed receive
Expedition Team Leader
, a highly coveted title, and Sirius earned
Navigator, First Officer
. My heart swelled. He did it. He’d manipulated the tests to be an aviator. I was so happy for him that for a moment I forgot all about the other part of our assignments: our lifemates.

I summoned the courage to scroll down. So far, I was content. If the job turned out okay, maybe the assignment would make me happy too. But only one name would make me truly happy. I held down the button until I reached the Lifemates section and found my name.

Andromeda Barliss
matched to
Corvus Holmes.

I stared at the backlit type, disbelieving. Had I read it wrong? I kept tracing my finger across the wallscreen, but every time it led me to the same name. Corvus was a perfectly fine boy, a little oafish, but he wasn’t Sirius.

Scrolling down farther, I finally found
Sirius Smith
and connected the adjacent column:
Nova Williams
. My heart stopped—then it beat faster and faster until I feared it would burst out of my chest. I screamed, and Mom clicked off the food congealizer with a
zap
. I didn’t wait for her to console me. I slammed my fist on the portal panel, stomped my foot while the particles dematerialized, and then ran into the corridor.

Tears blinded me as I pushed by people walking home from their jobs. I crashed into a service cart and toppled it over, sending tubes of liquid flying. The man behind it gave me an annoyed glare. “Watch where you’re walking, missy!”

“Sorry, sir.” I picked up a few of the tubes, replaced them on the cart, and stumbled forward. I had to find out what Sirius thought. I had to convince him to change the system.

There had to be a way.

When I reached his family’s cell on the lower deck, I pressed the portal panel and waited in agony until his dad paged me on the corridor’s wallscreen. An older version of Sirius’s face flashed on the pixels.

“Andromeda. Is there something wrong?”

Everything. My life, Paradise 21, the stupid Guide book. My entire world was wrong. “I need to speak with Sirius, please.”

Silence. I wondered if he knew why I was there. Then his dad’s voice came on again through the intercom. “I’ll get him.”

An eternity passed before the portal dematerialized. A few people gawked at me as they walked by. I must’ve looked crazy, hair pulled out of my braid and tears streaking my red-hot cheeks. Wiping at my face, I tried to compose myself.

Finally, Sirius emerged from the inner rooms. His face was set in serious lines and his arms were crossed. I wanted to part his arms and squeeze him, calling him mine.

He wasn’t. He was Nova’s. “Did you read the message?”

Sirius nodded, and his face clamped up. “I’m sorry, Annie.”

“We can request a change—”

He shook his head and waved it off. He’d already come to terms with it, and his reaction infuriated me. How could he throw away what we had in a handful of milliseconds? “You know they don’t honor requests.”

I was falling, plummeting into a dark and scary black hole, and he wouldn’t reach down to save me. “This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.”

“I thought it’d be different as well.” He glanced down as if he couldn’t stare into my eyes, black hair falling across his face in a shield. “I was stupid to believe we’d be together. Every question I answered correctly on that test brought me closer to the job I wanted, but I didn’t realize it also took me further away from you.”

My whole body trembled and I felt I’d fall into pieces on his doorstep like a broken DNA model, beads tumbling everywhere. I stepped forward and moved to touch him, but he drew back into his family room. “I can’t.”

“Sirius, please.”

“We can’t continue this. Now that the assignments have been given, people will talk if we’re seen together. There may be consequences.”

“Since when have you cared about consequences?” I’d followed him on every adventure. He’d slanted the results of the test in his favor, and now he wanted to play by the rules?

Sirius kept shaking his head. “It will just hurt both of us.”

As if I wasn’t hurt enough? I grasped out and clutched thin air. Sirius disappeared into his family room and the portal rematerialized, shutting me out of his life.

One thought outweighed all the others: I should have kissed him when I had the chance. Maybe then, if he’d felt what it was like, he would have argued for both of us.

Staring at the portal in disbelief, I collapsed against the far wall, crumpling as though he’d blasted me in the stomach with a laser. My world fell apart around me as I realized how much he’d been a part of it. Now I’d lost him. He was gone.

Nova’s words came back to me then in a thousand knives slicing open my heart.
Expects her grandpapa to just waste a high position on her.
She was right. My grandpapa would help me somehow manipulate the system to make it all right again. I hated asking him for a favor, but this was the one exception where I’d do anything.

Smearing my hand across my sniffling nose, I straightened up with new determination. Nova didn’t deserve Sirius. I didn’t care if they all thought I was spoiled; all I cared about was getting Sirius back. If it meant using my connections, then so be it. I stumbled over to the next hailing booth and punched in my grandpapa’s frequency, waiting for him to answer.

Long moments passed and I wondered if he was busy with the operations of the ship to protect the lives of the entire crew, which was more important to everyone than my lifemate dilemma. A wave of guilt rose, but I pushed it back down as I stood waiting for his answer. His ghostly face stared at me, wires shooting from his flaky skin.

“Are we there yet?” I crinkled up my nose at my question. Why did I always say stupid things when I got nervous?

My grandpapa smiled faintly, humoring me. “Almost, Andromeda. I can see it on the horizon.”

At least he wasn’t confusing me with Great-grandma Tiff. He looked much more awake since our time in the emergency room. His calm composure gave me courage. “Do you have a moment to talk?”

“Of course. I always have time for you.”

Relief poured through me. Maybe all I had to do was explain the situation to him and he’d set things right. “Good, because I have a favor to ask.”

My grandpapa smiled bigger, his wrinkles creasing up in folds in his upper cheeks. “Anything you want, my dear. Come to the control deck and we’ll work something out.”

Chapter Five

Plea

Bolting from the hailing station, I ran right into the one person on the entire ship I wanted to avoid.

“Corvus.”

He stared at me with concern shining in his blue eyes. He wore his uniform tightly around his chest and the muscles protruded underneath. Other girls would giggle and blush, but he reminded me of an over-stuffed hero toy. “Andromeda, are you okay?”

“No. I mean, yes.” I couldn’t look at him. My eyes roamed everywhere else: a dent in the chrome wall, the metal grating underneath our feet. He reached out and put his hand on my shoulder, the same place Sirius had just a few days ago at the funeral. The gesture angered me. That was Sirius’s spot.

I glared at him, and he blinked and removed his hand, scratching his short blond hair. Sirius’s hair fell in beautiful waves across his forehead, tempting me to run my fingers through it, whereas Corvus chose the military buzz-cut. Simplicity appealed to him, and it irked me because so many shady areas lurked in my thoughts.

“You just look so…worried. Why are you running down the hall?”

I fumbled, trying to think what to tell him. The truth would be cruel. In all honesty, I ran from my pairing with him. “I have to talk to my grandpapa.”

“Oh. Sorry to hold you up.” He bowed his head down and stepped aside, leaving the hallway open for my passage through.

I didn’t move. We paused, two statues frozen in awkward positions, and I studied him. Did he know about the assignments? If so, he gave no inkling. I wanted to snatch him up and lock him in a utility room until I sorted the assignments out.

But he was much bigger than me. I bet I could trick him into staying away from a screen. For all of his brute strength, he wasn’t much of a thinker. That would take extra time, though, and I really wanted to get the assignments sorted out before he got his hopes up.

He looked so earnestly sorry about holding me up I decided to give him a few extra words. “That’s all right.”

I moved past him, but his voice held me still. “Good luck, Andromeda.”

The cheerful cadence in his tone didn’t sound like him. I turned back, and he smiled.

“Thanks.” I hurried to grandpapa, more confused than ever.

Guards stood at attention in two rows along the corridor to the control deck. Recognizing me, they parted and I wove a path in between them, trying not to look into their faces. I didn’t want them to see the hurt etched in mine or the blasphemous question resting just beyond my lips. The portal to the control deck dematerialized and a current of cool, sterile air wafted out, blowing my hair behind me.

Grandpapa sat in the commander’s chair, surrounded by tubes gurgling with clear liquid. Before him, the vast tapestry of space unwound beyond the main sight panel, reaching its way across the entire deck in a half-dome. In the center glimmered the pinprick of Paradise 21. I blinked and my breath caught in my throat. It seemed twice as big as before.

“Come in, dear Andromeda.” He held up his hand and the tubes rustled, plastic crinkling. It pained me to see him in this fragile state, totally connected and dependent on the ship, but it was safer for him than wandering around in his hoverchair. The wires sprouting from his head seemed to hold him back so his head was tilted up. I could only see the bottoms of his eyes.

“What can I do for you?”

I fidgeted from foot to foot, trying not to look at the liquid flowing into his pasty arms. The scent of chemicals made my nose itch, but I ignored it and dared to go on. “We got our assignments today.”

“I know. I assumed you’d be happy to work with your mom. You won’t have to go far onto Paradise 21, and you can live beside the ship.”

He knew me better than I knew myself. Yes, I’d be happy tending the newly planted turf fields with mom. What he didn’t know was the shape of my heart.

“Yes, I’m fine with that.”

He seemed to relax a little, slumping down to let the wires droop. “Good. Now what is wrong, my dear?”

I bit my lip. Could I really say it out loud? I thought of Sirius, and a hard edge formed inside me. As I spoke, my voice gained force until my last words rang clear and true against the glass behind us. “It’s Corvus Holmes. I don’t want him. I want to be paired with Sirius Smith.”

The breathing apparatus connected to his neck rose and fell quicker, and a few tubes bubbled up with boiling water. Grandpapa’s body tensed, and I feared he might have another heart attack. This time it would be because of me.

“Grandpapa!” I ran to him and threw myself into his lap, hugging his chest, willing him to be all right. “Are you okay?”

“Yes.” His voice was faint, as if I heard him through a fuzzy intercom. “I wasn’t expecting that.”

I pulled away and looked into his eyes, noticing they were the same pale blue as Corvus’s and my own. “You can help me, right? You can change it?”