“Not a clue. I’m just telling you what the humans told Sixth. The scientists were experimenting on them, then they got told to set the humans aside, and return immediately to Zoraht. So they put the humans in stasis, dumped them like cargo in a storage locker on the Ciras Exchange, no doubt figuring they could get back to their experiments at a later point. The humans were in stasis for more than three months.”
“Kashrn,” I swear. “What in the name of Caeron were those idiot scientists thinking? The long-term effects of stasis on humans hasn’t been studied. Even putting them in stasis for their trip to Zoraht was dodgy.”
“I’d ask them what they were thinking, but alas, Sixth killed them.” Ruhan doesn’t sound the slightest bit sorry. His eyes swing to the joint I’m in the process of inspecting. “Run the balancer again.”
I don’t ask him why. When it comes to technology, Ruhan is preternaturally gifted. He probably won’t even be able to explain what’s made him uneasy.
He stares at the balancer readings as I run it down the metal strip. “There,” he says, when I’m about halfway through. “That spot.”
I look at the display. Fuck me, that’s impressive. Looking at the joint, through the comm projection, the image blurry because of both distance and atmospheric debris, he was able to spot that something was wrong. “It’s less than one percent off.”
“Yeah. It didn’t look right. You have a patch?”
“I do, yes.” I apply it under his careful eyes, and then move on, jumping to the next joint. Thank you, antigrav cuffs. It’s only when I pull out the balancer that I realize I forgot to turn the sensors back on.
That’s when the klaxons begin to blare.
Naomi is alone at home.
Fuck.
21
Naomi
Yes, I’m terrified that at any moment, Danek is going to succumb to the effects of the resonance. Yes, I’m frustrated that he hasn’t found any indication that there’s a secret prison on this planet, and it’s not from lack of searching.
But can I confess something? Against all odds, I’m loving my time on Noturn.
I’ve been reading up on mining operations. (Yeah, yeah, I know. Scintillating choice of reading material.) Miners are rare; mostly, minerals are extracted by giant diggers and other automated equipment, especially on planets where the atmosphere isn’t conducive to breathing.
But rihim is delicate and though Cindifin has tried repeatedly to extract it by machine, the losses are staggering.
Noturn is an anomaly in more ways than one. Cindifin really does seem to care about the wellbeing of its employees. Miners work six hour shifts for four consecutive days and they get the fifth day off.
And then there are the three relentlessly cheerful social activity coordinators, Praki, Claive, and Hessila, there for the express purpose of making sure we’re having a good time. The social calendar they’ve planned would not be out of place on a cruise ship, I kid you not. Every evening, there’s an activity. Movie screenings in the park. Cookouts and picnics. Potlucks, where we all make our favorite dish, syn-made or natural, and bring it to share.
It’s kind of awesome.
The people who were here before us must have been gardeners, because our small yard is filled with nilari bushes. Nilari berries are bright red in color, about the size of a grape, and they taste citrusy, a less-tart, sweeter version of a grapefruit. I snack on them incessantly.
In my apartment on Bestea, I defaulted to syn-made meals; I didn’t have energy for anything else. But on Noturn, I rediscover a long-forgotten love for cooking. I go to the store almost every day, buy new-to-me ingredients and experiment with reckless abandon. I make a nilari berry chutney, sweet and spicy and delicious. I bake a custard tart and decorate the top with the bright red fruit. I even toss a handful into a pot of curry, where they add just enough sweetness to cut the heat. It’s a ton of fun.
And then there’s Danek.
We’re sleeping together. We eat meals together. We sit in the park and watch movies together. We talk, sometimes about nothing in particular—when I’m not reading up on mining operations, I’m binge-reading a cozy mystery series, and Danek is confused about the fictional town of Hallowtown. “This makes no sense. Someone dies in every book, and you’ve read how many books?”
I’d bitten back my smile. “There are fifty-four books so far.”
“Fifty-four deaths in a town of two-thousand people.” He’d rolled his eyes. “That is, using your human measure, a homicide rate of twenty-seven-hundred.”
“And?”
He’d pulled up an entry on his tablet. “The most dangerous places on your home planet of Earth have a homicide rate of fifty-six. Your peaceful small town is fifty times more violent than that.”
I’d laughed. “You can’t bring logic into this,” I’d told him. “It’s fiction. It involves a certain suspension of belief.”
We don’t just talk about books. Sometimes, late at night, when the darkness hides our faces, we talk about more serious things. Intimate things. One night, I tell him about Will, about receiving the worst phone call of my life that January morning. “Were you in love with him?” he asks quietly.
I wish I could see his face. “Very much. Does that bother you?”
He holds me in silence as I talk, his touch comforting. “Are you still in love with him?”
“No.” I’m not in love with Will. I’ve mourned him for years, but I’ve let him go. The truth is far more disconcerting.
I’m falling in love with Danek.
And I’m too scared to tell him.
I’m contemplating the idea of a post-lunch nap when the door rings. Pumpkin, Plague, and Pestilence are at the door immediately, their noses pressed into the solid surface. “Give me room to open the door,” I tell them.
Obviously, that doesn’t work. “Coming,” I call out to the person on the other side. I scoop up one wriggling floof—Plague—and the other two
