motion, to picture the graph of the blade’s angle to the ground oscillating in a sine wave. The launch angle needs to counteract the parabolic path caused by gravity, so during evaluations and such, I’ll have to account for different grav-mag settings. With practice, instinct rather than computation guides the daggers where I want them.
After a few days, Wes resumes training and shows up in the Medical quarters to exercise. I touch his left bicep with a questioning expression.
“I feel a lot better,” he answers, and I drop my suddenly graceless hand. “They erased what Jupiter did to my arm. I can prove it to you right this second.” He slips into fighting stance, saying, “Have at you, Theta!”
Okay.
I trade blows with Wes for ten whole minutes, according to the timer on my handscreen, and land a few punches and kicks before he fells me. Although I’m still pathetic compared to him, we’re more evenly matched than before.
“I might actually be afraid of you,” he admits. “Want to take a break? Let’s go for a run. I found something I think you’d like to see.”
He leads me off, covering the circular perimeter of every floor before sprinting up a flight of stairs. We repeat this pattern seven times before we reach the top of the tower. Finally, he stands still. I try not to breathe too loudly. It would disturb the quiet, which is punctuated only by the whirring of disused medical equipment.
Side by side, we tiptoe into a small room, presumably a single-patient facility.
“Now look up.”
Through the small glass window in the ceiling, I see Cancer twinkling far, far away. I never knew the Medical quarters had real windows on the top floor, but I’m glad Wes did. This is my first glimpse of the sky in weeks. I never thought I’d miss it, but now I long to grab every cubic centimeter of space’s murky blackness and clutch it to my chest. I mustn’t shift my eyes from the stars to anything else, because if I do, maybe some will shoot away so fast that I won’t find them again. It’s a silly thought—the universe isn’t expanding quite that quickly—but there are thousands of light-years from their location to ours, so the way I see them, as they were ages ago, could be different from what they have become. Just as Cygnus and Anka—and Mom—may have changed from the way I see them in my mind.
Wes sits down on the cot and pats a spot nearby. I take it, making sure to stay at least half a meter away. Umbriel would chastise me if he were here—especially if he saw Wes sitting on his handscreen, finally not fidgeting. I’ve never had a blocked-handscreen conversation with anyone outside my family or Umbriel’s. Nevertheless, I slide my hand underneath the seat of my pants out of reciprocal courtesy.
“In my old home, we could see the entire sky from an observatory.”
How beautiful the sight must be. Base I, I’ve heard, has more windows than any of the other five. It isn’t any wealthier, but it’s less efficiently constructed because when our ancestors built it, they hadn’t yet found their moon legs, and they sacrificed insulation and shielding for aesthetics.
The greenhouses are the only buildings in Base IV with full glass ceilings. How lucky I was to see stars at all.
Willing my voice not to crack, I speak slowly. “I used to lie on the greenhouse floors with my best friend and pretend I was falling into the stars.”
Upon hearing a complete sentence leave my lips, Wes gawks at me. The Earth’s reflection creates an arc of sapphire across his eyeballs. I smile—he can be funny too.
“When you do speak, Phaet, you do it so . . . imaginatively. Like you can see the words take shape, and you pick only the most interesting combinations to say out loud. Is that what you spend your quiet time doing, writing pretty things in your head?”
I’m liberal with smiles today. I give Wes another.
Wes leans back on his hands and contemplates the circle of sky in the ceiling, a
After a few days, Wes resumes training and shows up in the Medical quarters to exercise. I touch his left bicep with a questioning expression.
“I feel a lot better,” he answers, and I drop my suddenly graceless hand. “They erased what Jupiter did to my arm. I can prove it to you right this second.” He slips into fighting stance, saying, “Have at you, Theta!”
Okay.
I trade blows with Wes for ten whole minutes, according to the timer on my handscreen, and land a few punches and kicks before he fells me. Although I’m still pathetic compared to him, we’re more evenly matched than before.
“I might actually be afraid of you,” he admits. “Want to take a break? Let’s go for a run. I found something I think you’d like to see.”
He leads me off, covering the circular perimeter of every floor before sprinting up a flight of stairs. We repeat this pattern seven times before we reach the top of the tower. Finally, he stands still. I try not to breathe too loudly. It would disturb the quiet, which is punctuated only by the whirring of disused medical equipment.
Side by side, we tiptoe into a small room, presumably a single-patient facility.
“Now look up.”
Through the small glass window in the ceiling, I see Cancer twinkling far, far away. I never knew the Medical quarters had real windows on the top floor, but I’m glad Wes did. This is my first glimpse of the sky in weeks. I never thought I’d miss it, but now I long to grab every cubic centimeter of space’s murky blackness and clutch it to my chest. I mustn’t shift my eyes from the stars to anything else, because if I do, maybe some will shoot away so fast that I won’t find them again. It’s a silly thought—the universe isn’t expanding quite that quickly—but there are thousands of light-years from their location to ours, so the way I see them, as they were ages ago, could be different from what they have become. Just as Cygnus and Anka—and Mom—may have changed from the way I see them in my mind.
Wes sits down on the cot and pats a spot nearby. I take it, making sure to stay at least half a meter away. Umbriel would chastise me if he were here—especially if he saw Wes sitting on his handscreen, finally not fidgeting. I’ve never had a blocked-handscreen conversation with anyone outside my family or Umbriel’s. Nevertheless, I slide my hand underneath the seat of my pants out of reciprocal courtesy.
“In my old home, we could see the entire sky from an observatory.”
How beautiful the sight must be. Base I, I’ve heard, has more windows than any of the other five. It isn’t any wealthier, but it’s less efficiently constructed because when our ancestors built it, they hadn’t yet found their moon legs, and they sacrificed insulation and shielding for aesthetics.
The greenhouses are the only buildings in Base IV with full glass ceilings. How lucky I was to see stars at all.
Willing my voice not to crack, I speak slowly. “I used to lie on the greenhouse floors with my best friend and pretend I was falling into the stars.”
Upon hearing a complete sentence leave my lips, Wes gawks at me. The Earth’s reflection creates an arc of sapphire across his eyeballs. I smile—he can be funny too.
“When you do speak, Phaet, you do it so . . . imaginatively. Like you can see the words take shape, and you pick only the most interesting combinations to say out loud. Is that what you spend your quiet time doing, writing pretty things in your head?”
I’m liberal with smiles today. I give Wes another.
Wes leans back on his hands and contemplates the circle of sky in the ceiling, a
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