“Just preparing to disembark,” Ian says with a grin, holding up our joined wrists. “The princess wants to come along—apparently, she can’t bear for us to be apart. So I’m just making sure we’ve got our stories straight.”
Merrick turns to me. “Are you okay with this?”
What am I supposed to say? No, I’m not okay with this—not even close. But the last thing I want right now is to instigate another fight between Merrick and Ian—Merrick’s black eye is only just fading.
I do want to go down to this planet, too. I actually do think I can be of some use if things go wrong. And while I’m furious with Ian, I’m also a little bit impressed. The man’s well of dirty tricks never ceases to amaze me.
So, I give a resigned smile. “I wouldn’t say okay, exactly, but I’ll be fine. At least he won’t leave me behind.”
“I do have a key,” Ian murmurs.
“If I’m so slippery, aren’t you worried I’ll knock you out, steal the key, and leave your bleeding corpse behind?”
“Bloodthirsty, isn’t she?” he says to Merrick. “But you have a point.” He pulls a small silver key out of his pocket and tosses it to Merrick. “Look after this until we get back.”
Merrick catches it, then says, “Beckett asked me to tell you we’ll be setting down at Rodos in five minutes. Be ready to disembark; the Starlight will be taking off again immediately. They cleared us for drop-off, not landfall.”
Ian nods. “Where’s that tosser Gage?”
“Here,” Max says from behind us. I turn. Gage is with him. He’s wearing a blanket over his lab suit like a poncho. Good move.
“Nice bracelet, Kali.” Max grins. “If I’d known you were into the kinky stuff, I would have obliged.”
“Ha-ha. It was a present from Ian.”
“Yeah, he pinched them from my bag.”
So, Ian isn’t the kinky one, after all. I’m sort of disappointed. Max tosses a blanket to Ian and then one to me. Mine’s gray, and Ian’s is black.
How did Max know I’d need a blanket? That I was going on this little trip? His prescience is a bit spooky.
He’s already cut a hole for my head, and I slip it on. It has the added advantage of hiding the cuffs, which might have otherwise inspired some difficult questions.
I feel the moment the Starlight touches down, light as a doklen’s feather.
“Looks like we’re on,” Ian says and heads toward the exit, tugging me along with him. Gage gives Max a peck on the cheek and falls in behind us.
The ramp is already lowering, bringing a wave of icy air into the ship, so I wrap my poncho closer around me. As I come to a halt beside Ian, I can’t help but gawk at Glacea’s sky port.
The sky is gray shading to white, the landscape bleached of color. It’s a bleak, desolate view, causing me to shiver, and not only from the cold. A sense of foreboding washes over me.
Now, when it’s too late, I wouldn’t mind staying on the ship.
Chapter 40
Ian
Kali comes to a full-on stop, and I give a little tug on her arm. I admit, it’s hardly the most welcoming of views, and already I can feel the icy cold seeping into my bones. But loitering here won’t make the view better. And it sure as fuck won’t get the job done.
I reach out with my mind again, but, like all the other times I’ve tried it, all I find is Max.
“Don’t worry,” he tells me. “We’ll find her.”
“I know. But could you try to sound a little more confident when you say that?” I ask.
“I’m doing the best I can here.”
“Yeah, I know.” We both are. So far, it hasn’t been close to enough.
And I’m beginning to suspect this leg of the trip isn’t going to have the happy ending I’ve been hoping for. If Milla were here, my sense of her would be sharper. But there’s nothing. No glimmer at all of her warmth or her wry sense of humor. Which means, if she is still here on Glacea, then she’s currently out of reach. Or she’s already gone, taken off-planet to who the fuck knows where.
I suspect the latter. But I live in hope. The eternal optimist—that’s me.
Right.
“Come on. Let’s get this done.”
I head down the ramp, and Kali comes with me—it’s not like she has a lot of choices. The handcuffs were a great idea. Though they might make things a little awkward if we have to run—or fight. Hopefully, it won’t come to that.
As soon as we reach the bottom of the ramp, Beckett starts drawing it in and I hear the change in the Starlight’s engines. Then she’s lifting off, and we all watch as she shoots away into space. The plan is that they return in two hours. If we’re not here, they take off and return an hour after that. And so on, until we’re done.
“What if they don’t come back?” Kali asks.
That had occurred to me. It’s why I left Max on board. Not that I don’t trust the others, but…yeah, I totally don’t trust them.
“They’ll come back. Max will make sure of it.” Then I glance at her, because I can’t not when she’s this close. It’s impossible to ignore her when I can smell the clean water and sweet berry scent of her. Considering we all share the same shower—and body wash—I don’t understand how she can smell so different than the rest of us. So much more appealing. I’m beginning to think it’s just Kali who’s so appealing, which isn’t a problem at all.
She’s biting on her lower lip so hard I’m afraid she’s going to make it bleed, and I want to tell her everything’s going to be all right. But I don’t know if it will be. In fact, I’m pretty certain it won’t.
Everything is fucked up. It has been for a long time, and I mean more than just Milla. Because if the Corporation doesn’t get us here, someone else will at the next stop. And if, by some miracle, we manage to avoid whoever is gunning for us, the fucking sun is just waiting to finish the job.
I’ve never really thought much about the whole dying-sun thing. And when I did, I guess I just figured it was one more way for the ruling classes to fuck us all over. You know, they’ve been telling everyone that things are so tight because they need all the resources they can get to fight this thing. And I was just like—yeah, more likely just to line their own pockets.
But now, after all I’ve seen and heard—on the Caelestis, in Rangar, and now from Kali—I’m starting to believe that there’s something to it after all. Maybe they are all telling the truth and the whole system is on the brink of burning if they don’t figure out what to do about it.
I hate thinking like that, mostly because I really hate thinking that Kali might have a point—that the Empress has had to make some tough decisions in pursuit of the greater good. And now that the Caelestis is gone—according to Kali, the one hope of salvation our whole shithole of a system had—it looks like we’re well and truly fucked.
Kali jiggles my arm. “You’re staring into space as though the end of the system is coming,” she says.
“Isn’t it?” I blow out my breath, then turn to Gage. “You studied the maps. Where to?”