'To see Gillian.'
'Can it wait?' Kahlee asked. 'Jiro's taking her readings.'
Hendel raised a curious eye. 'You're not supervising?'
'He knows what he's doing.'
For some reason, Hendel had never warmed to Jiro. It could have been the age difference — Jiro was one of the youngest members on the staff. Or it could have simply been a clash of personalities — Jiro was cheerful, extroverted, and talkative, whereas Hendel was, in a word, stoic.
'I've got nothing against Jiro,' he assured her, though she knew that wasn't completely true. 'But Gillian's not like the other students.'
'You worry about her too much.'
'That's funny,' he replied, 'coming from you.'
Kahlee let the comment slide. She and Hendel both spent a lot of extra time and attention on Gillian. It wasn't really fair to the other students, but Gillian was special. She needed more help than the others.
'She likes Jiro,' Kahlee explained. 'He'll do fine without you hovering around like an overprotective parent.'
'This has nothing to do with getting her readings,' Hendel grunted. 'Grayson wants to come for another visit.'
Kahlee stopped and grabbed her companion by the elbow, knocking the bigger man off stride and spinning him halfway around to face her.
'No,' she said firmly. 'I don't want her hearing that from you.'
'I'm in charge of security for this wing,' Hendel replied defensively. 'All visitation requests go through me for approval.'
'You're not seriously thinking of denying his request?' Kahlee asked, horrified. 'He's her
'If I think the visit poses a danger to the child I can deny a parent's request,' Hendel replied coolly.
'Danger? What kind of danger?'
'He's a drug addict, for Christ's sakes!'
'You can't prove that,' Kahlee warned. 'And you can't deny his request based on suspicions. Not without getting fired.'
'He wants to come the day after tomorrow!' Hen-del objected. 'I just need to see if Gillian's up to it. It might be better if he waits a few weeks so she can get used to the idea.'
'Yeah, right,' Kahlee replied sarcastically. 'It's all about what's best for her. Your personal feelings about Grayson have nothing to do with it.'
'Gillian needs routines and consistency,' Hendel insisted. 'You know how upset she gets if her schedule's disrupted. If he wants to be part of her life, he can come see her every month like the other parents, instead of once or twice a year whenever it's convenient for him. These unexpected visits are too hard on her.'
'She'll cope,' Kahlee said, eyes narrowing. 'I'll tell Gillian her father's coming. You just go back to your office and approve Grayson's request.'
Hendel opened his mouth to say something else, then wisely closed it.
'I'll get right on that,' he muttered, then walked off in the opposite direction, heading back toward the administrative wing of the building.
Kahlee watched him go, then took a deep breath to try and calm herself. Gillian was surprisingly perceptive; she tended to read and react to other people's emotions. And the girl looked up to Hendel. If he'd delivered the news of her father's trip, she almost certainly would have picked up on his disapproval, and had a sympathetic negative reaction. That wasn't fair to Grayson, or his daughter.
Gillian's room was at the far end of the dormitory, where there was less noise to disturb her. By the time Kahlee reached the door, she had plastered an expression of cheerful expectation on her face. She raised her fist and rapped lightly. Her knock was answered not by the girl, but by Jiro.
'Come in.'
The door slid open to reveal Gillian sitting at her desk. She was thin and angular, the tallest child in her age group by several inches. She had fine black hair that hung down almost to her waist, and eyes that seemed too wide and too far apart for her long face. Kahlee suspected she took after her mother, as apart from her slender build she didn't bear any real resemblance to Grayson.
Gillian was twelve, the same age as Nick. In fact, almost half the children in the Ascension Project came from the same approximate age group. Thirteen years ago three major industrial accidents, each at a different human colony, had occurred over a four-month span. The circumstances were suspicious, but investigations had uncovered no connection between the incidents. Of course, this had done little to quell the conspiracy theorists on the Extranet who refused to believe it was all just a tragic string of negligence and coincidence.
The third accident was by far the most devastating; some reports had initially called it the worst toxic disaster in human history. A fully loaded Eldfell-Ashland transport ship had exploded in atmosphere, killing the crew and spewing a deadly cloud of element zero over the entire Yandoa colony, exposing thousands of children in utero.
While the majority suffered no long-lasting harmful effects, several hundred of the unborn children developed significant symptoms ranging from cancer to organ damage, birth defects, and even spontaneous abortion. However, some good did come from the otherwise tragic statistics: thirty-seven of the exposed children had been diagnosed as not only healthy, but also with significant biotic potential of varying degree. All of them were now here at the Grissom Academy.
Gillian was staring with a disturbing intensity at the assignment on her computer screen. Sometimes she would sit like this for hours, motionless. Then, as if some undetectable switch went off in her mind, she would explode into a flurry of action, typing out answers so quickly her fingers were nothing but a blur. Her answers were, without variation, 100 percent correct.
'All done here?' Kahlee asked, directing the question at her assistant gathering up his equipment in the corner of the room.
'Just finished,' Jiro replied with a smile.
He was only twenty-five, handsome, and well put together. His features were a pleasing mix of both his American and Asian ancestry, and he wore his hair, dyed a dark red, in a spiky, tousled style that made it look as if he'd just rolled out of bed. An easy, confident charm and impish smile made Jiro appear even younger than he actually was.
'Gillian did very well today,' Jiro added, turning his smile toward the girl. 'Didn't you, Gillian?''
'I guess,' the girl muttered softly, though she didn't turn her head from the screen.
Gillian had good days and bad days, and the fact that she was speaking hinted to Kahlee that this might be one of the good ones.
'I have some exciting news,' she said, coming over to stand beside Jiro.
With any other child Kahlee would have sat on the edge of the desk, or rested a comforting hand on their shoulder. But for Gillian even the softest brush of a fingertip against her skin could sometimes cause her to react as if she'd been touched with a burning ember. Other times she seemed oblivious to all sensation, as if her nerve endings were completely dead. This made it difficult to get the daily readings Kahlee needed for her research. Fortunately, Gillian seemed to react well to Jiro, and he was usually able to get the data without causing her significant discomfort.
'Your father's coming to visit. He'll be here in two days.'
She waited for a reaction, and was relieved to see the faint hint of a smile touch the girl's lips. Jiro picked up on the subtle change in Gillian's mood and reacted to it quickly.
