PERSONAL RECORD: DESIGNATION ZETA4542910-9545E
CTS THALASSA
478.2.6.04
Last quarter, when I had traversed Thalassa’s corridors, crew members had gawked at my unsanctioned hair and attire. This time, greetings and occasional smiles bolstered my fluctuating confidence. The cumulative weight of the microdatacard, Freddie’s datastick, and my datapad pulled at my thigh pocket. My black pants and jacket felt more natural than my greys had. I had considered asking for a mourning band—for Freddie, for Lorik, even for Lytwin—but the words had stuck in my throat. It was as well. My friends would understand that those lives weighed on me, with or without any braided fabric.
The deep green of my shirt, however, pleased me even more. Every swish of fabric as I walked proclaimed, my shirt, my shirt, though with the jacket properly fastened, no one knew of my small rebellion.
The infirmary doors parted, and when Nate saw me, his mouth quirked into a brief smile. Edwards was entering data at a medtank’s terminal, but when Kyleigh rotated away from her old computer, her faint, welcoming smile seemed heavy, as if it took enormous effort. Jordan arced a brow. Zhen waved me forward but remained at Alec’s bedside, while Alec himself studied a cerulean box.
The doors clicked behind me, and I approached the foot of Alec’s bed. He turned the box over in his hands. Its blue shone in the infirmary’s bright light.
“Well, she’s finally here.” Zhen eased onto the bed beside him and tucked a loose curl behind his ear. “You’ve delayed long enough.”
He had waited for me? The thought sparked a burst of warmth in my chest.
Alec inhaled. “I know I have.” He set the lid aside.
Rare enough in their own right, a stack of paper envelopes filled the box to the top, but they were more unusual since, despite their tattered appearance, no Consortium-approved stamp certified delivery.
“She numbered them.” Alec sifted through the letters until he found an envelope with the numeral one circled on the lower right-hand corner. He opened the envelope’s flap and removed the contents as carefully as if he handled explosives. “Am I doing the right thing?”
“You are doing what your mother asked,” Zhen whispered. “Go ahead, babe.”
He began to scan the document, his forehead creasing as he read. Within seconds, he stopped. His face went suddenly and utterly pale. His hoverbed beeped, pulling Edwards from the medtank, but Alec batted everyone back and read it again.
“This . . . this is from my father.”
Jordan’s brows met over her nose. “We knew as much.”
Alec’s hand trembled as he held out the letter.
Zhen snatched it away, then gasped. “Alec, this is dated sixteen years ago!”
Seconds of quiet were shattered when Nate whooped. Alec dumped the box onto his bed and dug through the papers while I tried to remember why sixteen years mattered.
“The most recent one,” Alec croaked. “I need the most recent one!”
Multiple hands pushed papers aside, scattering them over the bed. Multiple voices called out numbers. A picture fluttered to the ground, and I picked it up without a glance at the image.
“Twenty-nine!” Jordan held an envelope above her head. She shoved it into Alec’s hand. “Open it!”
He tugged the letter out and skimmed the handwritten words as the headboard continued its mild alarm.
“Alexander Spanos,” Edwards commanded, “you must remain calm.”
“You don’t understand. My father”—Alec’s chest rose and fell quickly—“my father is alive, or was four years ago.”
Kyleigh sprang to her feet. “He wasn’t removed?”
“He was. My sister was dying, and he’d blamed the Consortium too loudly and too often. A man in green came with a Recorder, and the next day, my father left. He never came home. I assumed—I thought they’d killed him.”
“Stars above.” Jordan beamed. “This is the best news of the year!” Suddenly, her breath caught, and she spun to face me, her braids fanning around her shoulders. “A man in green said that’s what happened to my cousin. Is there a chance Gerry’s alive, too?”
“I do not know for certain. It is possible.” A ripple of guilt mocked my previous contentment. I should have checked.
Jordan sank onto the foot of Alec’s bed. Her beads clattered as her head slumped into her hands.
“Moons and stars.” Zhen’s eyes widened. “Your cousin, too?”
“They notified her family during her graduation party,” Nate said.
Zhen fingered the end of her blue plait. “Intimidation?”
“From what I remember, I’d say so.”
Jordan raised her head, and her golden-brown eyes shone. “Gerry, not dead. Stars.”
“Even so, that’s a decade at least for Gerry, and”—Nate glanced at the letter in Alec’s hand—“another four at least for Alec’s dad. My mother didn’t last four years in those mines.”
Zhen speared Nate with a glare. “They’ll be there. They’ll be fine.”
“The first letter—I put it down right here.” Alec scrabbled through the envelopes, pictures, certificates. “He was pressed into service to pay off fines for speaking against the Consortium. Wound up on a planetoid orbiting Krios. Which one? Blast it, Nate. I knew those fines should have been larger. The pittance we’ve paid shouldn’t have made a dent.” He found it, and his eyes darted across the page, then rotated it to read the crossed lines. “Someone in external processing knew a freighter who smuggled letters in exchange for food and medical rights.”
Zhen made a peculiar noise. “He gave up food and medical to get this out?”
“Which mine?” Nate demanded. “How did your mom contact him?”
Alec shook his head. “This doesn’t—wait—no.” He squinted at the page and marked a place with his index finger. “Krios-A137, Mining Site 12. He says she can send a reply care of”—he glanced at the page—“someone named Swokowski. On MTS Ibis.” He slung the covers away and tried to stand, but Zhen stopped him.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
“I can’t sit here.”
Protestations tumbled over each other, and finally, Jordan’s voice rose above the rest.
“You don’t have a choice,” she said almost roughly. “I’m sorry, Alec, but we’re stuck. I want to find him and Gerry, too, but we’re tilapia in a pond here. Even when Thalassa regains functionality, we have to get the cure back to New Triton.”
Before Zhen could snipe an answer at Jordan, Alec spoke. “Then I’ll track down Ibis and whoever Swokowski is.” He groaned. “But that EMP fried the memory banks.”
I should have searched for Gervase Singh and Alec’s father. My attention dropped to the picture I held. A handsome little boy with deep-brown curls held the hands of a laughing toddler above her head as she took a flat-footed step.
Alec and Arianna.
The unfairness of what terrorists and the Consortium had stolen from Alec and countless others smote me again. When the Consortium network reactivated, I could redeem some of the damage my people had done, but doing so would betray my usage of Lorik’s drone, which would betray James and Daniel. My stomach twisted.
Nate touched the back of my hand. “You’ve got that look on your face, sweetheart. Have you thought of something?”
All conversation ceased. All focus shifted to me.
“Yes, and no.” I dared not drum my thigh with Zhen present. “If I used the Consortium’s network—”
“It’s running?” Alec interrupted quickly.
“No.” The medtanks burbled in the quiet while I studied the twenty-nine envelopes and the family pictures scattered on Alec’s white cotton blanket. “But theoretically, I could utilize the Elder’s drone to search for your father. I believe I can hide the former Recorders’ identities safely in other data, but I am not . . . confident. Reactivation might lead the Consortium straight to me and betray both James and Daniel.”
“Recorder-who-isn’t-and-needs-a-name,” Alec said as if it were a name in truth.
I blinked back moisture and met his gaze. “Yes?”
“Even though your guesses are more reliable than most people’s facts, don’t do anything to put yourself or anyone else at risk.” The letter crinkled as his fingers clenched. “And it might.”
The only protest I could muster was “Alec.”
“There’s been enough hurt from seventeen years ago. Let it stop now.” He swallowed, then added, “If I’d listened to my mother when she insisted I read these, years ago, everything might be different.” His gaze fell to the letter in his fist, and he laid it on his thigh and attempted to smooth it out. His voice dropped. “Stars, what a stupid kid.”
“You’re not stupid, Alec,” Nate said firmly. “Never have been. A bit hardheaded from time to time, maybe. But I promise we’ll figure this out.”
In that instant, I wished with all my heart to find the people my friends had lost. Perhaps a trace, like the one I created to find Max’s son and daughter, would suffice, for even though their names and numbers had been removed from public records, the Consortium must have tracked their movements. I handed Alec the picture. Stillness settled over his features as his fingertips brushed the laughing toddler’s face.
“I hope so, Nate,” Alec murmured. “I hope so.”