After putting on her shoes and a fresh shirt, Triana began the daily ritual of brushing her long brown hair. She was sitting in front of her mirror when Lita buzzed at the door, then walked in.

  “Hey, girlfriend.”

  Triana smiled at Lita’s reflection in the mirror. “I’m almost ready. Have a seat.”

  Lita plopped onto the bed and glanced around. “It kills me how neat you keep this place. You’re even in here by yourself, so nobody ever sees it. I don’t know how you do it.”

  “Just a neat freak, I guess.”

  Lita shook her head. “Do me a favor and at least leave a pair of underwear or a towel lying around sometime, will you? Just to make me feel better.”

  Triana’s smile slowly dissipated. “Not to be gloomy, but if we don’t figure out a way in the next ten hours to stop this killer beam from Titan, underwear and wet towels will no longer matter.”

  Lita stretched back, propping herself up on her elbows, her feet dangling off the bed. “Funny you should say ‘killer beam.’ That’s exactly what I wanted to talk to you about.”

  I knew it, Triana thought. She kept quiet, brushing her hair, and watched her friend in the mirror.

  “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about everything,” Lita said, “and I have come to the conclusion that this is not a killer beam. It might be killing us, but not intentionally.”

  She held up a hand and began to count things off with her fingers. “One, the power grids went out several times as they probed our ship. Two, they made some sort of bizarre contact with Bon and the other patients in Sick House, almost as if they were probing their minds. Three, they altered the communications signal from the Titan research station, scrambling it into some kind of impossible code. Four, they somehow tinkered with Bon to the point that he almost killed himself with superhuman strength and endurance. And . . .” She paused before flipping up the final digit. “Five, they took over the ion drive and supercharged our speed. Galahad was never built to go this fast.”

  Triana said, “Right. So what are you trying to say?”

  “I’m saying that everything they have done could maybe be interpreted as a—what’s the word? Malicious?—malicious intention to destroy us. But, if you ask me, it’s simply their way of . . . improving us.”

  Triana set down her brush and turned around to face her friend. “Improving us?”

  Lita nodded. “Uh-huh. Think about it. They obviously have the power to blow us out of space without going to this much trouble. Instead, it seems they’re more like galactic handymen who can’t help fix something they think is broken.”

  Triana’s eyes focused on the wall behind Lita. “So . . . they have no idea that they’re killing us.”

  “No. As far as they’re concerned, our ship—and our bodies, for that matter—are not tuned properly. They’re giving us the mother of all tune-ups.” She sat up on the edge of the bed. “And you want to know the best part? They told us that already, and we just didn’t understand.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Remember when Bon was channeling those voices? Remember what they said through him? ‘Help. Help here.’ And we thought that meant ‘help us here.’ But it didn’t. It meant ‘help is here.’ ” She let that sink in a moment. “They have simply been waiting a long time to help someone. Imagine their joy when, first, they get a research station full of inferior beings, followed by an entire shipload passing by. They . . . they just don’t know their own strength. Ever seen a four-year-old hurt a baby brother or sister by trying to lift them up and accidentally dislocating their shoulder?”

  Triana bit her lip, then looked back at Lita. “Unbelievable. We’re about to be exterminated by an intelligent life force that wants to help us.”

  Gap stood in front of the power grid in the Engineering section, his hands on his hips, a disgusted look on his face. This just wasn’t right: the most powerful ship ever built, the most intricate power system ever devised, and they had absolutely no control over it. Helpless, that was the word. And it was a word that Gap despised.

  “This stinks,” he said.

  “Yes, it does,” came a voice behind him.

  He whirled around to find Hannah standing there, her hands clasped behind her back. She looked uncomfortable, perhaps nervous. “Oh, hi,” he said. “How long have you been there?”

  “Just a second. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

  Gap waved this off. “No problem. Just deep in thought, I guess. I never heard you walk in.” He leaned back against the console. “What’s up?”

  “Oh, just wanted to see if you had . . . I don’t know, figured anything out yet.”

  He shook his head. “If you mean stopping the explosion, no. But I did find something a little interesting.” He gestured for her to stand next to him at the power grid. Hannah hesitated, then walked shyly up to his side. Was it his imagination, or did she have some light berry scent about her? Certainly not perfume. Was it the smell of her hair?

  “Look at this,” he said, pointing to the graph. “The energy beam fell away as soon as Titan went behind Saturn, right? Well, you would expect that to mean all of our readings should drop to normal. But they haven’t.” He indicated one solitary line on the screen. “This is our total power output. It’s sitting at about one percent above normal.”

  Hannah stared at the line. “Residual power.”

  Gap was impressed. “Yeah. It’s like a leftover gift from Titan. Whatever that beam was doing to drive our engines above capacity, it somehow left behind a little token nudge of power.”

  “And that won’t hurt us, right?”

  “Shouldn’t.” Gap chuckled. “Maybe get us to Eos a little faster, though. I don’t think anybody would complain about that.”

  Hannah eyed the power grid. Her studies at Galahad’s training center had given her the basic knowledge of the Engineering section, and her work duty in the mission’s first six weeks had been here, so much of what she saw now would be familiar. And, with her strong interest in math and science, Gap knew she was comfortable learning the finer details.

  And he had to admit that he was enjoying her company.

  Her expression turned grave. “So, any ideas at all?”

  Gap exhaled and put his hands in his back pockets. “Yeah. My idea is that we find some way to tell these guys to leave us alone.”

  Hannah slowly broke into a smile. Gap couldn’t take his eyes off her until she turned her attention to him, then quickly looked away. “But we’ll figure something out,” he said.

  Whatever she thought of this confidence, Hannah politely nodded agreement. After an awkward moment of silence she seemed to gather a bit of courage. Quietly, in a voice that was so low that Gap had to strain to hear, she said, “I know this is a silly time to ask, but . . .” She trailed off, and Gap had the feeling that her sudden supply of courage was leaking away.

  “What is it?” he said.

  “Well . . . like I said, this is obviously a bad time to ask, but I was wondering . . .” She broke off again and looked down at the floor. “I was wondering if maybe sometime you wouldn’t mind teaching me how to Airboard.”

  Gap was so surprised at the request that he stood silently for a moment. She had essentially asked him out. In a roundabout way, of course, but what did that matter? In those few seconds a hundred thoughts flashed through his head. What should he say? How should he say it? And how humbling was the lesson that he had just learned in a flash from this shy girl from Alaska? He hadn’t known how to approach Triana, and had watched her get away. He hadn’t known whether to approach Hannah or not, with his emotions still in a knot and his own courage very much in question. And here she was, having to make the first move.

  He realized that she was mistaking his silence for “no.” An embarrassed look of resignation began to cross her face, and she said, “If you can’t, I understand. That’s okay, I know there’s a lot—”

  “I’d love to,” he blurted out.

  She looked back up into his face, and gradually smiled again. “Really?”

  He returned the smile. “Absolutely. We’ll get you some pads and a helmet and get you going. You’ll love it.”

  “It looks like fun. I mean, I’ve never been very sports-minded, but . . . I’d still like to try.”

  Gap suddenly felt terrible. They had both obviously been attracted to each other, and he’d had multiple opportunities to see her. Even a lunch or dinner together. Now she was doing the only thing she could think of to get one-on-one time with him, and it was something that she probably didn’t really like at all. He felt a moment of shame.

  “If you like it,” he said, “great. If not, we can find something else to do.” The words sounded clumsy to him, but he didn’t care. For the moment Triana was a million miles away.

  Hannah looked him in the eye. “I have to get back,” she said. “Just call me when you get a chance to get away. After this is all cleared up, of course,” she added, gesturing to the power grid.

  “Yeah, no problem,” he said.

  Before he knew what she was doing she had pulled her other hand from behind her back. He realized that she’d kept it hidden the entire time she’d been talking to him. Now she extended it, offering him something.

  He looked down and saw her holding a small sketch, drawn with dark inks on a beige piece of paper. “I did this a couple of weeks ago, and thought you might like it,” she said.

  She handed him the vague drawing that she had kept on her desk. He studied the outline, recognizing himself, and sensing the care that had gone into the creation. A lump formed in his throat. How stupid had he been to have ignored her for so long?

  When he looked up to thank her, she was gone.

  29

  Don’t wander too far off,” Channy said. Then, watching Iris saunter into the first row of tomato plants, she muttered to herself, “Listen to me, I’m talking to a cat like it understands anything I’m saying.”

  There was an unusually large amount of activity in the Domes at the moment, and Channy assumed it must be harvest time for one of the crops. She had walked around holding Iris until finally finding a peaceful spot where they wouldn’t be in anyone’s way. One of Bon’s assistants had come around to hand water a section nearby, puzzling Channy. “I thought there was some sort of automatic watering system,” she said to the worker, who responded with, “Don’t ask.”

  Now she was bored. As predicted, the constant trek to and from the Domes had become old. And if Bon didn’t seem to mind—still a little shocking to her—then perhaps it was time for Iris to move up here permanently. That would definitely be a topic of discussion at the next Council meeting.

  Assuming, of course, that they could overcome this latest life-threatening dilemma.

  Channy didn’t want to think about that.

  “Hurry up,” she called out. Iris responded with a yawn, then stretched out in the soil and batted at a dirt clod. As impatient as she was, Channy couldn’t help grin at the cat’s playful attitude.

  “Hey, you want to try one of your toys again?” She reached into the bag in her pocket and pulled out the small metal ball. “What about this one? You interested yet?” The cat’s eyes were drawn to the gleam of the metal surface, but when Channy rolled it past her the interest waned again. Channy rolled her eyes. “You never want to play with that one. That’s the biggest waste of a cat toy I’ve ever seen.” She pulled the stuffed mouse out of the bag and tossed it a few feet away. Iris jumped to her feet and pounced on it.

  “Figures.” Exasperated, Channy kicked the metal ball off into the tomato plants. “I’ll tell you what,” she said to the cat. “We’re going to try a little experiment, since this might become your new home. You stay here and play, and I’ll come back in an hour or two, okay? You seem happy enough.” She started to walk toward the path that led to the Dome exit. “I’m talking to a cat, again,” she said under her breath, shaking her head.

  Not far away, Triana stood in Bon’s office looking out the large window into Dome 1. The buzz of activity in the fields was interesting to watch. She made a comment about this to the Swede.

  “Interesting?” he said. “I suppose.” He continued his work at a lab table, holding up a small beaker that held a clear liquid, just enough to cover the bottom. Using an eyedropper, he squeezed in a few drops of another substance, then swirled the mixture around. “But when you grow up around it, it becomes more of a job.”

  She turned to face him. “But you love it.”

  He grunted an answer that could have been “I guess.” The mixture had begun to turn a light shade of pink. Triana couldn’t tell by the look on his face whether this was the desired result or not.

  She pointed to the beaker. “Is this what you wanted to talk about? Is this one of your new ideas for the Farms?”

  He didn’t look up, nor did he answer right away. After fiddling with the experiment for another minute he finally said, “I think so.”

  Triana laughed spontaneously. “That’s an interesting response. You think so?”

  When he looked up at her, she noticed for the first time that a normal color had slowly returned to his eyes. The swelled pupils had retracted, the orange glow had vanished, and she found herself gazing into the ice blue tint that she had always found beautiful. “Yeah,” he said. “I think so. It’s hard to explain.”

  “Try.”

  He leaned back against the lab table and stuffed his hands into his pockets. “When I woke up in Sick House, my headache was pretty much gone, and I seemed to be able to think much more clearly. As soon as I got back here to work I started coming up with some great new ideas for the crops. Some of it might have been stuff that I learned from my dad but tweaked a little bit.” A troubled look came over his face. “He was . . . he was a fairly prominent hydroponics farmer in his day. Did a lot of experimental stuff with plant breeding, that sort of thing.”

  Triana remained silent. If Bon’s feelings were anything like the ones she had for her own dad, then she understood the pain evident in his expression. Was this another link to him, another explanation for feelings that otherwise made no sense to her?

  It certainly was another opportunity for her to peer inside, a momentary window into the troubled soul tucked away from everyone. As far as Triana knew, she was the only person on the ship allowed these brief glimpses. What made these moments so precious to her? Some inner need to help, to console? A nurturing gene, one that had wanted so badly to help her dad, and now detected another heart in need?

  Or was she looking at it the wrong way? Maybe this was about her own loneliness, her own need to be nurtured. And would Bon have that gene within him? She forced herself to postpone this reflection and to refocus on their discussion.

  “Anyway,” Bon said, “I didn’t write much down. I just thought I would start working on the ideas as time went by. But . . .” His voice trailed off and he shrugged. “But I seem to have forgotten most of it. This,” he indicated the lab work, “is my best guess. I think it’s pretty close to what I imagined. Bits and pieces.”

  “And this . . . memory loss,” Triana said. “Did it start as soon as we lost contact with Titan?”

  “What would that have to do with anything?”

  “Maybe nothing. Maybe it’s just coincidence. But that’s a pretty big coincidence, wouldn’t you say?” When he only stared at her, she continued. “Sounds to me like your connection with the forces on Titan have come unplugged.”

  After several days of the new, mellower Bon, she was taken aback by his suddenly angry tone, a tone that indicated the window had slammed shut.

  “That’s ridiculous,” he said, the familiar scowl returning to his face. “For your information, I am not a puppet. I am not under anybody’s control.”

  “I’m not saying you’re a puppet, Bon. I’m saying—”

  “I know what you’re saying. You’re saying that without this . . . this . . . this energy beam, or whatever you call it, I can’t come up with any new ideas myself.”

  “That’s definitely not what I’m saying. It’s just—”

  “Nobody controls me.”

  “Would you just let me finish?” she said. “For crying out loud, settle down. This is not some macho control thing.”

  He appeared to seethe, but crossed his arms and stared at her. She let the atmosphere cool a moment, then softened her voice.

  “Listen to me. We only have some bizarre facts to go on. For one thing, you definitely were being manipulated by this beam while you were unconscious, whether you like that term or not. You’ve seen the video; it channeled voices into you from the other patients. We saw it, we heard it.

  “Even you have to admit that your physical skills have been, shall we say, honed to a new level. The way Channy described it, you were like a superhero in the gym. I’m sorry, but that’s not normal. Then you tell me that you suddenly have great ideas, things that you’re sure can benefit all of us. You’re anxious to try them out.”

  She took a deep breath. “Then, Titan disappears temporarily behind Saturn, and what happens? Your eyes start to change back to their original color, and suddenly you’re having a hard time remembering these great visions you had for the Farms. Now what conclusion would you draw from all that?”

  He remained silent, but she could tell that the words had had an impact. “Would you like to run over to the gym and see if you can replicate your last workout? I’m willing to bet that you can’t. And guess what? This is not some criticism of your skills or your intellect. We have no idea what this energy beam really is, or what it’s doing to you or the ship. Lita had a pretty good theory, though.”

  She took a minute to explain the discussion the two girls had shared. Bon seemed to relax a little more, and leaned back on the table. Finally he nodded his head.

  “Okay,” he admitted, “that makes sense.”

  For a moment Triana thought she saw the flicker of a new emotion cross Bon’s face. Was it . . . fear?

 

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