From the Indie Side by Indie Side Publishing Page A

it and through his mouth.
He did his best to not be a hindrance. Cort wasn’t very good at
bot-ball, but at least he could keep his side of green team
upright, not tripping over anything. He even had a few good plants
while the right leg got some good shots off. It wasn’t bad playing
a support role, especially since he didn’t make a fool of
himself.
    In the first fifteen-minute period, they got
two shots on goal and did adequate damage to the yellow bot.
Everyone received the exact same score, of course, but Cort kept
his own tally and thought his team had done well. Not that he would
say such a thing. Not on Mars.
    When the horn sounded, signaling the first
intermission, Cort glanced up to catch the girl’s attention, maybe
see which team she’d been on.
    But she was gone.
    He looked around as the kids on his level ran
for the exit to get refreshments and use the public suction
potties. Cort used the time to gather his breath. He watched the
kids file out of their level, all in the same direction, clockwise
around the glass partition. He turned back to his controls.
    The blond girl sat beside him, arriving from
the opposite side.
    “Hello,” she said through her computer.
    Cort reached up and pushed the breathing tube
back in his mouth, biting down on it hard. He concentrated on the
words, forcing them into the computer. “Nice see you,” he said.
    He shook his head, his forehead breaking out
in a clammy sweat, and tried again. “Nice to you,” it came out.
    The girl looked away, through the glass
partition and across the gym’s pit. Her hair—that close—it was like
staring at liquid gold. Cort wanted to reach out and touch it, or
smell it. He felt dizzy.
    “Talk with your mouth,” the girl said through
her computer. She looked around to make sure they were alone. “I
want to see.”
    Cort felt like he was going to wet his pants,
he was so flustered and anxious. He looked side to side before
pulling the tube out, allowing it to hang from his pack. He turned
his head away while he wiped his mouth dry.
    “My name’s Cort,” he said, looking back at
her. It was all he could think to say.
    “Riley,” she said. She stared at his lips.
The computer made her voice ring with a sonorous and pleasing tone.
Cort wanted to be able to speak like that. But with a boy’s
voice.
    He smiled at her.
    “Did it hurt?” she asked.
    “Did what hurt?” Cort glanced up at the
balcony above. Some of the kids were returning to their seats,
holding colorful refreshment canisters up to their breathing
tubes.
    “Your first breath,” Riley said. “They say it
hurts real bad, and that all Earth kids have to go through it. They
say it makes you scream.”
    “I don’t remember,” Cort said. He licked his
lips, self-conscious of doing the opposite of what his mom had told
him.
    “It was that bad?” Riley asked. “Have you
blocked it out?”
    Cort shook his head. “I don’t think so,” he
said. “I actually don’t remember much before I was five.”
    Riley brushed some of her golden hair back.
Cort saw one of her ears poking through, white and smooth. It made
her look like an elf princess or something equally mysterious and
regal.
    “And it doesn’t burn? The air?” She leaned
forward, staring at Cort’s mouth.
    It made him want to cover his mouth with both
hands. Or open it up and let her look inside. Or both, somehow.
    He shook his head. “It doesn’t burn at all.”
He watched the fluid circulating through her breathing tube. “How
does that feel?” He pointed shyly toward her mouth. “Is it like
drowning?”
    Riley’s computer laughed for her. “No, silly,
this is how we are even before we’re born. I can’t imagine my lungs
empty, the way yours must be.”
    The corners of her mouth turned up a little,
a dimple forming in one cheek. Cort recognized it as a smile. And
pretty.
    He started to say something about her hair,
but she cut him off.
    “You should put it back in,” Riley said,
pointing to her