‘Maybe it’s not size they’re after,’ Kowalski countered. ‘Could be significance. Something in a peculiarly crowded area.’
Hours later, we were still nowhere. The dusty-red colour of the artificial skies were slowly bleeding away into darkness. My arse was numb from squatting, my eyes sore from staring at the flexiscreen. I needed a drink, badly. I kept scanning each dossier, each particle, each file, running through the parameters in hopes something would click. Nothing. Only vague traces and patterns that trailed off into dead ends. Kowalski’s sporadic yawns had become continuous, until she rose to go, planning to be back in the morning. She patted my shoulder as she left. The room was silent except for the humming of the mainframes and computational substrates hidden behind the mirror-smooth walls. The distant tubes continued to wink like the eye of some mischievous neon creature, scattering colours across the frothing water. I was vaguely aware my spine was aching, but I was still focused, enough that it took Grim a few tries to snag my attention.
‘Listen, Vak.’ Grim was scratching at his pits. ‘We’ve been hacking away at this for hours. Hours. It’s not happening tonight.’
I glanced at the digital timer in my shib. Dawn was fast approaching. ‘That doesn’t matter,’ I said. ‘We have to keep trying.’
‘Yeah. I get that. But our options are limited right now, you know?’ Grim stooped down next to me, close enough for me to see the ache for sleep in his red-rimmed eyes. ‘We’re looking for an attack that could take place anywhere. In an asteroid. It could be outside our door, or down in Changhao, down in Starklands, up in the Greenlakes suburb, anywhere in between. We’re not going to find it. Not tonight.’
Images flashed through my head like a flexiscreen burn-in. Katherine’s body, shaking against mine. Us standing on the windy balcony, finding solidarity in sharing our grief. ‘No. Dozens, maybe hundreds will die if the Suns launch their attack.’ I was aware my voice was rising, louder than I realised. And why was my face so flushed? ‘Those pricks don’t care who dies. Don’t you care about them?’
‘Hey, hey! Of course I care!’ Grim frowned, leaned forward so close our bodies were almost touching. ‘Mate, you all right?’ He stretched out a hand. ‘Your neck … you’re so blue.’
I slapped his hand away. ‘Don’t,’ I rasped. ‘Don’t touch me.’
Grim took a breath. ‘Vak, I hear you leaving in the middle of the night. Going out for hours, coming back restless and reeking of booze and sweat. Sometimes you don’t come back until dawn. I don’t want to get on your case about it, you know? But it’s hard not to. When was the last time you had a full night’s sleep?’
I felt my neck and tried not to react to the slithering mass under the skin. ‘No. We need to keep working, we need to find this—’
‘Not gonna happen, Vak. Not tonight. Let it go. Just for a minute, okay?’
My knuckles turned white at my sides. ‘Don’t,’ I heaved out. Sweat slithered down my armpits. ‘Don’t treat me like I’m going to explode. Not you.’
‘I’m not! I’m—’
‘Stop, Grim. Just stop.’
‘Or what?’ Grim was on his feet. ‘You going to hurt me? Like you almost did in the arena? Or in the apartment? I saw it in you. You wanted to. So go ahead.’ Grim spread his arms. His eyes, usually mischievous and sly, were glistening and wide with fear. ‘Take a swing.’
I backed away, the scene crashing down on me. It was like retreating from a mountain ledge, roaring with wind. The world tilted, swam with black spots. No, blue spots. They swarmed my vision until I was drowning in them. My friend stood still, eyes fixed on me.
I was going to destroy him.
I was going to destroy everyone around me.
The twitching virus in my body wasn’t just altering me, it was eating me away. I was poison. Had Artyom seen it? Had he left New Vladi not because of what our father was, but because of what I’d become?
‘I’m sorry,’ I told Grim. The words unlocked something that had been unconsciously building up in me, and all my rage evaporated at once. My arms dropped to my sides. ‘This stuff, it isn’t me. It’s doing things to my head. But that’s no excuse. I’m going to fix this, Grim. I swear it. If it’s the last thing I do. I’m not going to lose you.’
Grim’s shoulders drooped. I hated the way I tore him down and exposed this sensitive core he tried so hard to armour up. With all his jokes and mischief, I often forgot how vulnerable he was. He was more adrift than I was, his home, family and everything he knew destroyed.
‘I’m sorry. That wasn’t fair of me either,’ he sniffed.
I shook my head. ‘You’ve got every right to be angry with me.’
‘Maybe.’ A watery grin climbed across my friend’s face. ‘Sometimes it’s hard not to be. But someone’s gotta say it, right?’
I attempted a smile. ‘Right.’
The workspace had two mattresses tucked away in a subsurface compartment and we took one each. Flat on my back, I watched the curving ribbon of departing ships framed by the V made by my feet as I tried to think. The House of Suns wouldn’t launch an attack on a facility that had no immediate value to their cause. They were deliberate and precise. So what did they most want to gain from their next attack?
Sell to as many aliens as possible.
I remember being on campaign, stalking through an evacuated city with the rest of my fireteam. Can’t remember the name of the planet, or how long we spent there. I do remember how our armoured buggy bounced as it rode over the potholes and cracked asphalt, my back aching for weeks afterwards. Reconnaissance teams had sighted Harvesters around
