A Closed and Common Orbit (Wayfarers #2)(46)

She looked up.

Jane couldn’t move. The cold was making her shaky, but that was the only thing about her that moved, except for her heart, beating real loud in her ears. The sky was . . . it was . . . it was so full. And now that she knew what the specks were, it made her head spin and her mouth dry.

There were dozens of stars. Dozens of dozens, way too many to count, just like her questions. There were big stars and little stars and some that were kind of red or blue. There wasn’t any part of sky that didn’t have stars, but most of them were in one big big big strip that was fluffy and soft and so so bright. Owl had showed her a picture of a galaxy, but this was different. This was real. This was real.

A few days ago, the factory had been everything. There were no planets. There were no stars. The big blue day sky had been confusing enough, but this . . . There were people out in the stars. So many people! All those little bits of light, they all had planets – so big that you couldn’t even tell that you were standing on a ball – and all those planets had people, and species! Species in different colours and kinds. Jane couldn’t even picture that many people. It didn’t make sense. None of it made sense.

She sat down. She didn’t know if she felt good or if she felt sick. The Mothers had to know this was here. They didn’t leave the factory, she figured, but they had to know. Why didn’t the girls know? Why hadn’t they been told? Why couldn’t they go outside? They could still sort scrap even if they knew about the sky! Jane felt something bad, something she didn’t have a word for. She felt all hot and wrong. She wanted to break something on purpose.

But then she looked up again, up at the big soft galaxy, and after a bit, she felt okay. She felt good. Somehow, outside, looking at the stars, everything was a little better. It didn’t make sense in her head, but it did down in her stomach. She looked at the stars, and she knew all her questions would get answered, all the things would get fixed. All this weird stuff was okay.

Jane wished that 64 had gone outside, too. She wished that 64 had met Owl, and that they’d learned about the sky together. Jane felt hot and wrong again, and even the stars couldn’t fix that.

She lay down on her back, looking and looking. She thought about species and ships. She thought about people.

They’d be happy to see her, Owl had said.

The cold air was starting to make her shake real hard, and it kind of hurt, too, so she climbed down the ladder and went back inside.

‘Owl?’ she said, facing a screen. ‘I think . . . I think fixing the ship would be a real good task.’

Owl looked so, so pleased. ‘You do?’

‘Yes,’ Jane said. She nodded hard. ‘Yes. Let’s go to space.’





SIDRA


Sidra’s internal clock reset itself, and the kit smiled wide. ‘I’m getting my tattoo today,’ she said. Her petbot looked up as she spoke, snuggling happily in the kit’s lap.

Pepper looked over from her corner of the couch. ‘Did it just hit midnight?’

‘Yes.’

Pepper laughed. ‘Your appointment isn’t for, what, ten hours?’

‘Ten and a half.’

Pepper laughed again, then returned her gaze to the breathing mask she was tinkering with. ‘And you’re still not going to tell me what design you and your artist cooked up?’

‘No,’ Sidra said, stroking the petbot’s head. Pepper had been pestering her for hints ever since she’d heard about Sidra’s first trip to Steady Hand. ‘Not unless you ask me directly.’

Pepper shook her head and put up her palm. ‘I can respect a surprise. I’m just excited to see it.’ She held a bolt between her teeth and continued speaking around it. ‘Are you nervous?’

Sidra considered. ‘Yes, but not in a bad way. More . . . anticipatory.’ She shifted memory files around as she spoke. The Linking jack plugged into the base of the kit’s skull was supplying her with one of Tak’s favourite adventure novels, which he’d mentioned during their last meeting. ‘Have you ever heard of A Song for Seven?’ she asked. ‘It’s an Aeluon book.’

Pepper shook her head as she fussed with the mask. Sidra was unsurprised. There wasn’t much Pepper had read beyond tech manuals and food drone menus. ‘Is that what you’re processing now?’

‘Yes.’ Sidra saw no reason to supply the additional explanation that she was adding it to her local memory. Her memory banks were still filling faster than she was comfortable with, but she saw little point in reopening the argument, at least right now.

‘Are you enjoying it?’ Pepper asked.

‘Very much,’ Sidra said. ‘The phrasing can be challenging, but it’s a good translation, and the complexity makes for some wonderfully layered nuance.’ She was aware, as she said it, that she was repeating what Tak had said about it, word for word. Well, why not? He’d sounded smart when he’d said it; why couldn’t she?

Pepper raised her hairless brow with a smirk. ‘That’s a fancy way of saying “dense”.’

Sidra knew Pepper was kidding, but something in her bristled nonetheless. The words Pepper was scoffing at didn’t belong to Sidra, and she didn’t like Pepper’s implication that their original speaker was being pretentious. Tak was educated, and it was one of the things Sidra enjoyed most about speaking with him. Pepper was intelligent, no question, but . . .