50
How do you do it?” Sean asked. “How do you release yourself?”
Dillon sat on the bed at the back of the clinic. He wrestled with the air before him, as he always did when he struggled to find the words. “I just . . . do it.”
They could not bar the others from observing. But they could do their best to ignore their presence. Because they spoke English, Carver kept up a soft translation as Sean said, “Think back to the first hunt. Before it was natural. Take your time. No, don’t look at the others. Forget them. It’s just us now.” Sean used the voice he applied when talking Dillon down from one of his schoolyard rages. Steady and calm. Giving him the space to focus. “Talk through it. I know it doesn’t make sense. But we left logic behind a long time ago. Just relax and—”
“I sort of hunker down inside.” Dillon stared at the blank white wall above Sean’s head. Seeing only the event. “Deep down. Fit myself in a space that I make right there at the core.”
“Exactly there. I make a bubble like the one we’ve used to send thoughts, only tighter. And then I stick everything in there. Everything that’s me.” Dillon focused on his brother. “It’s like I’ve already split from my body before I move.”
“I understand,” Sean said. And he did.
“Then I take a quick little right-hand turn. Just shift around. And step out. Like I step into a transit. Only I’m not using my feet because I don’t have any.” Dillon shrugged. “And I’m out.”
Chenel said softly, “It took me months and months to learn what you just described.”
But Sean didn’t have months. He probably didn’t have hours. He needed to do this now. He asked Elenya, “Will you anchor me?”
She was beyond solemn. “Will you take care? Will you come back to me?”
“Yes to both.”
“Then of course I will.”
He waited while she fashioned the invisible belt, then said to Carver, “You’ll need to spot my brother, since that’s been my job.”
When Dillon translated for Carey, she asked, “Can I do that?”
“Later,” Dillon replied, the affection crystal clear in that one word. “Soon. Right now you can time us.”
“Okay,” Sean said. “Let’s go for it.”
The first time was a lot scarier than Sean had expected. The moment of bodily separation felt too much like a small death. Sean’s brain registered an animal panic, like he was underwater and only a second or so from drowning. But he formed the bubble and scrunched down, cramming all that he was inside, just like Dillon had described. Then he wrenched himself free.
As soon as he was out and hovering beside himself, the fear was gone. Like it had never existed. He had one brief instant to look down to where Elenya rested a hand upon his arm. Her affection radiated out and around them both, a unique form of shielding. Sean had never realized until this very moment that her love had a color all its own.
Then he turned to where Dillon hovered, waiting. Sean crossed the mental distance and connected with his brother. He had a fleeting sense of bonding with a fabric of emotion and genetic makeup that linked them in a unique fashion. Love and anger and frustration and all the impossible sentiments from growing through lives that were both individual and joined. Dillon must have felt the same, for he paused in the process of launching. He offered Sean a bodiless version of the warrior’s grin. The schoolyard knight off to save the world. Sean was filled with the familiar surge of exasperation and pride and affection.
Then Dillon took aim. And they flew.
Walls meant nothing. Or space. Dillon aimed and they went. Sean’s brother hunted like a bird of prey. Like he had been doing it all his life. Dillon swooped down the center of the station, a long, swift glide. As they moved, he turned them in a slow circle so their attention went out in every direction. Wherever he aimed, his attention was crystal, vivid, pinpoint. Dillon noted incoming and outgoing trains. Exits. Chambers. People. All of it in swift glimpses.
Gradually Sean overcame the newness and the sensory overload and focused with his brother. As soon as that happened, he sensed the wrongness. Whether it came through Dillon or he tasted it himself, Sean could not say. But it was definitely there. The lingering fragrance played over him like an acid mist. Fraying his shield in tiny gasps of wrongness.
They reached the far end of the station, and Dillon wheeled about, readying for the return. Instantly Sean saw the anchor’s importance. The destination was unmistakable. Elenya’s touch on his arm and her surrounding affection were beacons that guided him with a sureness so intense he was able to release his hold on Dillon and fly alone. Taking himself home.
He opened his eyes. Felt the gasping pleasure of breathing in and out. Reconnected with his body. Life coursing through him. Alive and there with the woman he was coming not just to care for but to see.
Elenya asked, “Are you all right?”
Sean took exquisite delight in sitting up, reaching out with his arms, and holding her. The moment was too intense to allow the smiles and gazes of others to intrude. He whispered, “I saw your love.”
He felt her shift her face where his shoulder met his neck, and knew she was wiping away tears. Knew also it was not his return that frightened her so. But what this success meant. What was now going to happen.
Sean held her until she was ready to let him go. He made a process of settling her in close beside him, holding her hand, then asking, “How long were we gone?”
Carey replied, “Three minutes, sixteen seconds.”
“Dillon, is it always that way, the scent?”
“Or taste, whatever. Yeah, that’s how it seems.”
“But they’re not around now, right?”
“I’m pretty sure they haven’t been back in a while.”
“Me too.” He turned to where Carver stood with Anyon and Tatyana. “Okay. This means the aliens have been here. Inside the station. Several times.”
Anyon was clearly a man struggling with internal conflict. He wanted to doubt and dismiss, and at the same time he desperately wanted to raise the alarm. “You’re certain?”
“Yes,” Dillon said. “We are.”
Sean only told the Watchers the absolute minimum. “You need to hold your hunts to the shortest possible time. I think this scent we’ve found is there because the aliens are making their own quick forays. They dart in, check things out, and leave before we detect them.”
“And that’s what you need to do,” Dillon said. “Every time.”
“Faster than us if you can,” Sean said. “Just long enough to catch the scent and make sure they haven’t come back. Then return.”
Chenel looked at her partner. “Who is up?”
“You,” Baran replied.
Dillon shifted off his bunk. As Chenel took his place, she said, “Describe to me what I’m seeking.”
“Best not,” Dillon replied.
“Go out there and see for yourself,” Sean added. “Something this important, you need to decide without any prompts from me whether it’s real.”
Chenel moved slowly. Carefully. As though already practicing the caution of a tracker entering Indian country on a solitary foray.
Baran fashioned the invisible belt, then took station by her shoulder. One finger of one hand resting on Chenel’s arm. “Ready.”
Chenel shut her eyes. Sighed. And went still.
The entire room held its breath.
Ninety seconds and several eons passed. Then Chenel breathed again. Sat up. Looked at Carver. “Colonel, Counselor, Ambassador, I ask that you note the time.”
Carver was the only one who moved. “Noted.”
“Senior Watcher Chenel hereby gives official notice that the aliens have been here. We must assume they were scouting for an attack. I therefore urge you to raise the alarm.”