Edge of Dark (22 page)

Charlie nodded, unsure what to say. Hard to tell what was truth and what was fear and what was legend when people talked about the Next.

Gunnar seemed to accept the nod, since he continued. “We've been assuming the Edge stayed fragmented. Like we are.”

That got Charlie's attention. “The Deep is fragmented?”

“The Glittering is fragmented. I suppose we are, too. For example—you and I have different ideas about what to do with planets. Stations don't all have the same laws. The High Sweet Home was experimenting with animals in ways that we don't allow here, and at least a few of the smaller stations are essentially religions colonies. It's not like there's a solar-system-wide government.”

“Fair enough,” Charlie said. “I guess I grew up thinking we thought one way on Lym and all of the spacers thought a different way.”

Gunnar looked directly at Charlie, his expression a mask of patient, irritating kindness. “That's a child's way of thinking.”

The words stung. The same trap he'd fallen into a few minutes ago, being naive. He'd have to get better at watching his mouth.

“If you're going to be any help to Nona,” Gunnar said, “you need to study.”

“I already am,” he said, feeling defensive and mad at himself for it. “I can see it's not that simple now that I'm here.” He glanced at Nona. “Besides, while I want to be all the help to Nona that any friend can be, I'm not here just for her. Lym needs a voice, and a way to get information. That's why I came. It's beautiful, you know. Worth saving.” He gestured outward, even though he wasn't sure exactly what direction he should be pointing.

He was supposed to be an ambassador. This might be a once-in-a-lifetime chance to convince a possible protector that Lym mattered. “We've spent generations on restoration. There's work that's almost done, like decontaminating almost all of Goland. There's whole ecosystems that we hardly need to interfere with at all.”

Gunnar looked unimpressed.

Charlie continued, struggling not to sound desperate. “There's beauty in a world we didn't make. Power in it—power of its own. The ability to surprise us, to evolve. All that we ever were before we grew out into the Glittering is there, in the wild places. We are animals!”

“That might be true if we came from here,” Gunnar said. “But Lym is no more than a colony planet.”

Charlie sat back, forced himself calm. “I do understand that history. I also know we need you to fight to protect the treaties you made with us.”

Gunnar laughed, a deep warm sort of belly laugh. “At least you're persistent.”

“I am.”

Charlie didn't think he'd made any headway with Gunnar at all. But Nona looked pleased with the exchange, at least if the small smile playing around her lips and eyes was a decent indicator.

A strong hand on Charlie's shoulder jerked him out of bed with the instincts of a ranger. He blinked in the low light, certain he hadn't slept enough. He felt caught between reality and fading dreams of flying his skimmer through open space, surrounded by stars and chased by ships full of machines. “Wake up,” someone whispered. “It's time to go.” Satyana's voice.

“I thought we were going to spend a week here.”

“You were. But while we were visiting Gunnar yesterday, the Council met. They allowed a military order to stop ships from coming or going while they come up with ways to inspect everything.”

“You don't look happy about that.”

“It's not our way.” She pushed a warm glass of stim at him, and he curled his fingers around it and raised it to his lips. The sweet, dark flavor Nona called chocolate. Either the drink or the urgency in Satyana's voice woke him up. “So we're leaving before they stop us?”

“I've filed your flight plan. Nona's there already.”

He finished the stim, the heat nearly scorching his throat. “Are you sure we should go?”

“You could get trapped here. The new rules take effect at the end of this shift change. That's in four hours. If we miss this window, you can't get out without calling attention to your departure.”

“All right. Leave so I can get dressed.”

“That's old fashioned of you.” It truly sounded like a comment instead of a flirt, but he was happy when the door closed behind her. He pulled on his best clothes and threw everything else in his duffel. More clothes, his slate, a rock from home that he'd taken off of his dresser at Manny's at the last minute before he came away from Lym.

She started off leading him toward the ship's bays. “I don't know what you're going to find,” she said. “Stay safe. Don't let Nona do anything stupid.”

“She doesn't strike me as stupid.”

“She isn't. But she's never been brave before. So promise me.”

Their hurried footsteps echoed in the metal corridor. “She's an adult. She'll make her own choices.”

Satyana narrowed her eyes at him. “You seem to be teaching her that.”

“Someone has to.”

She laughed, then. The most genuine laugh he had heard from her yet. “She's not ready for this, you know. Somewhere down on Lym she finally understood that she can make a difference. But she hasn't had much experience trying to change the world.”

“None of us are ready for this,” he said.

They walked fast and said nothing for a bit, the small woman pacing him with no trouble at all. They were leaving Satyana. He'd known that, and been grateful for it, but he had a feeling she would join the things he unexpectedly missed. “Stay safe here,” he said. “Try to keep Lym safe.”

She laughed again, this time with a touch of bitterness. “We'll try to keep
everything
safe. But we don't know much more about the Next than you do. We should, but we don't. We've paid far more attention to our own problems and not enough to anything else. It's stupid to feel invincible.”

She was almost babbling. He couldn't imagine her being afraid, except perhaps for Nona. Maybe it was just that they were in a hurry. Or maybe everyone in the entire Glittering was scared now. He was. He swallowed and told Satyana, “We'll do our best.”

They entered the ship's bay and jogged toward the
Sultry Savior
. Nona must have seen them. She swarmed down the ramp and raced to Satyana, holding her so close he could barely tell they were two beings instead of one.

He watched them, amused.

Nona tore herself loose from Satyana, and grabbed his hand as she came by, tugging him behind her. At the top of the ramp, they turned to watch Satyana jog quietly away.

“I'm going to miss her,” Nona said.

“Didn't you go to Lym partly to get away from her?” Charlie asked.

“It's complicated.” Nona turned briefly, glancing over her shoulder. “Come to the control room?”

He followed Nona, dropping his bag and the one Satyana had given him both into a locker on the way. The two of them strapped into acceleration couches and lay still. In front of them, a screen came to life, showing the outer door of the bay opening up, and the stars beyond. The
Sultry Savior
pulled out of the bay slowly and floated gently away from the Diamond Deep.

When the ship sped up, the movement was so smooth he hardly noticed it at all, just a slight change in his weight that pressed on him a bit more and then a bit more and then even more. “Maybe I'll get back there some day,” he said. “To the Deep.”

“There's a lot I had planned to show you.”

“There's a lot I had planned to show you on Lym.” He smiled and watched the stars, which really didn't change much. In truth he was a tiny being, strapped unmoving to a couch inside of a tiny ship beside a tiny station rotating around a tiny sun, which was merely one star among many in the galaxy, and that again was one galaxy in a universe.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

CHRYSTAL

Chrystal, Yi, and Jason stood together across the room from Katherine, who sat on the floor, knees up, arms wrapped tightly around them, her head buried in her arms. They had done her body exactly right, the slender waist, the long limbs, the long neck, and even the fabulous dragon tattoo. The only physical flaw was perfection. If the Next had gotten anything wrong, it would be easier for Chrystal to watch Katherine sit so still and look so lost, and easier to be rejected.

A long time had passed. Maybe more than a day.

Chrystal whispered, “I wish one of
them
was here. Jhailing might know what to do.”

“They're probably watching us,” Yi said.

“Great.” Jason moved a little away, pacing. He was also physically perfect—broad of shoulder and slender in the waist, well muscled. It seemed as though all of the perfection that had hidden inside of their human bodies had been honed in some awful fire of creation. She wondered if Jason was still stronger than her.

They didn't have any plumbing. No stomachs, no genitals, no inner ears. Their bodies were gendered by shape, but not sensation.

Still, from the outside, they looked fabulous.

God damn it!
Everything was wrong. Her brain wouldn't stick to the problem at hand. She went and knelt beside Katherine for about the fifth time. “Please talk to us,” she whispered. “I know it's hard. It's hard for all of us. But we need each other. I need you, your laughter, your silliness.”

Katherine didn't even move.

Chrystal's voice came out louder than she meant it to. “I love you.”

Nothing.

Chrystal made her way back. “How do we know she's alive? We don't breathe.”

Yi said, “I bet her grip would fail if she died.”

“We're all dead,” Jason said.

Chrystal was tired of the sentiment. She had spent what felt like weeks thinking it herself. She touched his cheek. “No. Whatever we are—we in this moment—we're alive. We aren't our old selves—how could we be? But we are alive.”

“Getting existential?” Jason asked.

“Big ideas aside,” Yi said. “I think I have a smaller idea that might help her. Remember when you asked me how I know so much about the Next? And I told you that I braided? That's what they call it. Did any of them talk to you about it?”

“No.”

“No.”

“But they talked to you in your heads?”

They both answered, “Yes.”

“That's the first step. We're using our voices now, but we probably don't have to.”

Chrystal supposed that was true. She tried to think at Yi the way she'd thought her answers at Jhailing.

“I feel you,” Yi said, smiling. “But not clearly. Think something easy.”

She thought,
I love you
.

Yi looked puzzled. “What did you say?”

She said it out loud. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.” Yi smiled at her, and reached a hand up to her cheek. “Try a single word. Something concrete. Picture it and send it to me.”

She tried,
Rose
.

It took ten tries and a few pep talks from Yi and Jason, but Yi eventually gave her a broad smile and said,
Rose
.

Then it was Jason's turn. They worked at it until they could think short sentences at each other and get them right over half the time. During the long practice, Chrystal kept glancing at Katherine. She moved a few times, shifting position, but Chrystal never caught her looking at them. She could surely hear them talking out loud. It was impossible to tell if she could hear them talking to each other in silence. “Are we going to be able to stay together?” she asked Yi.

“I don't know. It's not like we need to eat or even sleep. You don't sleep any more do you?”

She stopped, confused by the question. She used to. Even since all this happened. Like being turned on and off. “I don't know when I slept last,” she said.

“Not for a while,” Jason said.

But I could stand to get out of this white room
, Chrystal thought.

“Me, too.”

She narrowed her eyes at Yi. “You heard that.”

“I did.”

“I didn't,” Jason added.

The dual exchange wore on her. Her body wasn't tired. This body never tired. “I think maybe
I
am tired,” she said. “My heart's tired.”

“But we haven't helped Katherine yet,” Jason said.

“No.” She walked back over beside Katherine's still form and curled up on the floor next to her, one hand on one of Katherine's feet.
Maybe I don't have to sleep any more,
she thought.
But I do need a rest
.

Within a few minutes Yi and Jason had joined her, Jason also on his side, spooning her the way he used to spoon her in bed and both of them naked now, too. It wasn't the same. It would never be the same. She tried to push her sadness away. It didn't do anything good for her.

Yi sat up straight and watched them all.

She had to find the good. They were all together, still a family. “If this weren't so horrible,” she said out loud, “If this weren't so tragic, this moment would be sweet.”