It had taken a few days to be sure, but by now there wasn’t any doubt. Except for some plumpness around its belly, the colorful lizard had gone from iguana-sized to something half that, like a big gecko. The troubling part was not being able to ask anyone about the species or research it any way. There was little enough out there on the Drenard planet and even less on its fauna. All Molly knew was that the strange animal had taken to eating and drinking more than a Glemot—but despite all that intake, it continued to waste away…
Walter’s door slid open, recessing into the jamb with a quiet hiss. The young Palan exited his room and peeked across the cargo bay. Up in the cockpit, he could see one of Molly’s elbows sticking out over the flight controls. The ship was dark and silent, the barest glow of dawn lighting up the sky beyond the canopy. Walter tip-toed across the hallway and unlocked Molly’s cabin door with her Captain’s codes. He kept an eye forward as he waited for her room to slide open.
Slipping inside, Walter forced down the panicked feeling that gets Junior Pirates in trouble—the “heist shakes” that’ll get someone busted faster than the floods. You have to think clearly, he always reminded himself. Stay focused on the loot. Remember what you’re after.
It helped that he’d done this several times in the past weeks.
He went to her dresser, dropped down to one knee, and opened the narrow drawer at the bottom. Two stacks of clothes: the white tanks she wears under her flightsuit on one side and the plain cotton underwear on the other.
Walter reached under the latter, feeling for his treasure. His.
He wrapped his fingers around the small piece of fabric and pulled it out. Rubbing it with one thumb, he realized how unnecessary this charade was. She should just give it to him. Willingly.
Bending close to the carpet, he looked for the single hair he knew would be there and found it. He slid the drawer closed, holding the hair in place until it caught in the dresser. Walter shook his head at the ancient trick, resolving to love her even though she did stupid stuff like this.
He keyed open her door and bent down low, his palms on the ship’s decking. Slowly, he peeked around the corner of the doorway, keeping his head in a spot people rarely looked. Molly’s elbow was still visible sticking out over the controls. Walter pushed up from the deck and darted across the hall, back to his own room. As he ran, he clutched his new favorite thing to his chest, eager to get alone with it.
He left the lights out in his room and went straight to the bed, jumping under the covers. Feeling with his fingers, he found the seam in the piece of cloth and made sure it was in the back. With a shiver of anticipation, he lowered the red band down over his forehead.
“Hello?” he thought.
Silence. He waited, growing impatient. Several minutes seemed to go by, but it could’ve been a fraction of that—
“Ah! Walter, it’ss been a while.”
“Yeah,” he thought, “I haven’t had the time. Been bussy.” It was a lie. Truth was, Molly hadn’t been off the ship long enough to do any proper snooping in almost three days.
“Well, I can’t wait to hear about what you’ve been up to.”
“Ssure, but not now. I, uh, can’t talk long thiss time.”
“I undersstand. Hey, I meant to assk you about ssomething lasst time, but you had to run before I could bring it up. You know thosse two armss you have? The oness in the bottom of the tool chesst?”
Walter cringed at the incessant hissing from the stranger’s choice of words, the red band relaying everything in his own voice.
“Arms?” he thought aloud. “I—how did you know about thosse?”
“You were thinking about them the firsst time we sspoke. Don’t you remember? I heard it quite clearly.”
“Oh.” Walter forgot it worked that way. But why would he have been thinking about those stupid things?
“Ssurely you know the armss I’m talking about. Unlesss you jusst have armss sstrewn all over the sship—”
“What? No. No. They’re the only oness. But I wanted to talk about—”
“Right, right. The gold. Well here’ss the deal, Walter, I really would love to help you claim it, but firsst I’m going to need a favor from you.”
“Okay, but it better not get me in trouble.”
“Of coursse, of coursse. All I need you to do iss get me thosse armss. Do you think you could do that?”
“What? Why?”
“Doess it matter? I could jusst asss eassily assk you what you want with thoussandss of barrelss of gold.”
“I don’t know.” Walter rubbed his head, thinking. His coppery hair felt soft under his hand; it was getting too long and needed another pass with the shaver. He tried to picture himself with it grown out and what Molly would think about it. “How do I get them to you?” he asked. “Where are you?”
“I’m on my way to a little planet called Lok. Do you know it?”
Walter nodded. “Yeah.”
“Exscellent. Wait, you’re not there now, are you?”
“Am I thinking that?” Walter asked.
“Why don’t you tell me where you are?” the voice asked. “I’ll come right to you. Quick as I can.”
Walter shook his head. He knew how these transactions went down. It was always best to get information, never a good idea to give it.
“I’ll bring them to you,” Walter thought. “Jusst pick a sspot.”
“And you can deliver them? You have a sship?”
“Yess,” Walter hissed.
It was another lie, but he kept those thoughts deep. Palan deep. The truth was: it didn’t matter that he had no ship of his own, nor did it matter he couldn’t even fly one. What he could do was reprogram hyperdrives to go wherever he wanted, just like how he’d sent Cole into a star and what he’d done back on Palan. With that kind of talent, every ship was practically his, and he may as well be the one flying them.
Molly checked the instruments on the dash one more time, making sure her mom was on course and holding steady, before she leaned over her reader. Typing on the thing was quite painful with the current state of her fingers, all of which were scabbed and blistered with dozens of votes. And yet, the writing was psychologically soothing, somehow, even though she couldn’t properly phrase an ounce of what she was feeling. It didn’t seem to matter; just attempting to do so—to reach out to Cole in some tangible way—eased the pressing weight off her chest, allowing her to breathe a little.
She stared at the first two sentences of the journal tab while the Wadi crawled down her flightsuit and stretched back out along her thigh.
6/10/2414
Dearest Cole,
I got a new reader on Lok. So, here I am, writing you a letter on it.
Horrid. She deleted the entry. Then she wrote the exact same thing. She deleted it once more. She repeated the same stilted, juvenile wording over and over. Molly finally shook her head and decided to start from scratch, forgetting the need to make it perfect. She would simply write her thoughts as they came to her, unscripted and unedited.