A Closed and Common Orbit (Wayfarers #2)(104)

Blue glanced around as he unpacked snacks. ‘I dunno. Where’d you leave it?’

‘Here,’ Pepper said. ‘I left it right here.’

‘It’s kind of a mess in here,’ Blue said. ‘I’ll help you look.’

Pepper walked her brain back through what she’d done before she’d gone out with Blue. Blue’d said she needed to eat. She hadn’t wanted to, but he pushed, and she’d said she needed some extra wire anyway. She’d finished the dregs of her mek and set down the wrench. Right there. She’d set it down right there.

Something in her gut turned over. She was pretty sure it wasn’t the snapfruit.





SIDRA


‘Want to go out when we’re done?’ she asked Tak as they walked through the museum to Curator Thixis’s office. ‘I saw a few dance halls by the docks. One of them had a sign saying they’re hosting a tet tonight.’

Tak scoffed. Her cheeks were calm as a pond, thanks to yet another hasty, hefty dose of tallflower and mek. ‘I can’t believe you’re making jokes right now.’

‘I wasn’t joking,’ Sidra said. ‘You should get something out of this.’

‘Coupling in an Aandrisk shuttledock bar was not exactly what I had in mind.’ Tak paused. ‘That sounded pretty okay out loud, didn’t it?’

Sidra flashed a mischievous smile. ‘I mean, you might as well do some actual interspecies social studies while you’re here.’

Tak laughed, but the sound faded as they reached the curator’s office. There was a note displayed on the pixel board affixed to the door.

Gone home for the evening! Please take any inquiries next door.

They looked at each other and shrugged, moving along to the next office. There was a sound coming from the other side – a delicate mechanical whirring. Tak rang the chime. The whirring stopped, and other sounds replaced it: a dragged chair, a set of footsteps moving closer. The door spun open, and on the edge of her field of vision, Sidra could see Tak stiffen. Her pathways reacted much the same.

The office they’d come to belonged to an Aeluon.

‘Can I help you?’ the new curator said, removing a pair of safety goggles. On the worktable behind him lay some kind of cleaning apparatus and an antiquated microprobe, battered and broken after however long it had spent drifting between stars. The curator’s expression was friendly, but Sidra caught his gaze lingering on Tak’s face, just for a split second. Sidra couldn’t say what he’d noticed, but he’d noticed something, no mistake. He flashed his cheeks at Tak – a greeting, probably, given the dominant colours, but the tinge of inquisitive brown couldn’t be missed.

Tak did something odd, by Aeluon standards: she answered aloud without responding visually. ‘Sorry to bother you,’ she said. ‘I met with Curator Thixis earlier regarding a research project—’

‘Ah, yes,’ the curator said. ‘Yes, she told me.’ Sidra studied his face as unobtrusively as she could. In a typical social situation, Tak’s choice to speak even though it wasn’t necessary would have been taken as a gesture of inclusion for Sidra’s sake. But Tak’s total omission of a hued reply was awkward at best, rude at worst. Sidra knew that tallflower or no, lying in colour was even harder to do than subduing emotions, but how this Aeluon would interpret Tak’s alternative solution was impossible to guess. His next words revealed nothing: ‘I’m Curator Joje,’ he said, with a nod to Sidra. ‘You must be part of the research team.’

‘Yes,’ she said brightly, keeping her face cheerful. Was it too cheerful? Oh, stars, why wasn’t the Aandrisk here?

‘Weren’t there more of you?’

‘They weren’t feeling well,’ she said, her pathways sighing in gratitude for Professor Velut Deg and his excellent tutelage of AI Programming 2. She’d write him a thank-you letter when they got back.

Curator Joje’s eyelids slid sideways. ‘Seems like a long way for a research team to come without all of them getting the chance to actually research.’ Sidra didn’t know how to respond to that. Neither did Tak, who appeared – to Sidra, at least – to be pouring her focus into personal chromatophore management. Curator Joje broke the silence with a shrug. ‘Well, your formwork’s cleared, and your wristpatches should allow you to access exhibit models now.’ He moved back into his office and lifted a heavy piece of tech from a table. ‘Here’s a power supply,’ he said, depositing the heavy thing into Sidra’s hands. ‘That should be sufficient to switch on any systems you want to analyse more closely. Obviously, the fuel tanks are empty, so you won’t be able to do much more than activate environmental and diagnostic systems.’

‘That’s fine,’ Tak said. ‘We won’t need more than that.’ She glanced at Sidra, as if to ask we won’t, right?

Sidra gave her head an almost imperceptible shake.

Joje looked at Tak. ‘I’m required to tell you that your waiver only grants you permission to inspect the materials on exhibit. Nothing can be removed or disassembled, and you’re responsible for any damages that occur.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Forgive me, but you don’t appear to be feeling well either.’

‘I . . . have allergies,’ Tak said.