Jayme tried to ignore him. “I’ve always been interested in the ancient humanoid cultures. Remember after you found that panspermia fossil? I wrote a history paper on the unity of the cultures on Kurl, Indri VII, and Sothis III.”
“I remember,” Moll said.
Most of the other tourists had drifted from the courtyard, proceeding to the hostel desk to pick up their room assignments. Jayme started walking sideways, so she could grin up at Moll Enor. “I guess I’ll see you later.”
Moll shook her head after the incongruous couple. What had possessed Jayme to bring Bobbie Ray? The big orange Rex ambled toward the interior, oblivious to the stares of the alien children with their parents. Moll had already noted the way kids–and nubile young women–were drawn to the fuzzy Rex.
Jayme gave a cheery wave as she went under the portico. Moll sighed again, feeling herself pull back when she really didn’t want to. Without a doubt, Jayme was the best friend she’d ever had. Moll just wished she had asked to join her on this trip instead of running after her. But to be fair, she had never given Jayme any reason to suspect that she would have agreed to go on a trip together.
Actually, Moll wished she had thought of it herself. It was about time they confronted this issue between them, and a ramble through the ruins would have been perfect.
Yet now, without a choice in the matter, Moll wanted to get out of the hostel before Jayme cornered her in her room. The chase was on, and as always, Moll Enor was running.
The heavy piers rose into the shadows, with the vaults lit by a few strategic spotlights. Moll Enor wandered among the ruins, consulting her travel padd and craning her neck to see the notable elements of the construction.
Jayme yawned as she trailed after her friend, reconsidering whether this had been such a smart idea. With her eidetic memory, Moll Enor soaked up cultures like water, always wanting to know more. Jayme was ready to return to the beach, where they could have a long, relaxing swim. Yet Moll seemed content to endlessly examine the small sculptures–alien heads and exotic animals, leaves and flowers–that were carved into the huge stone blocks.
Moll went through another one of the narrow slits in the wall, while Jayme sat down to wait in a niche, figuring it was close enough to a bench for all intents and purposes. She sat kicking her heels for a long time, but when Moll still didn’t reappear, she decided it wouldn’t hurt to prod her friend along a little.
But the slit didn’t lead to a side chamber like all the others; it was the entrance to yet another underground maze. Jayme checked down a few turns of the maze, then panicked when she took a wrong passageway and got caught in a dead end. The mazes could take hours to traverse, and the tourists had been warned time and again not to go into one without a tricorder. Moll had their padd‑guide, and she was long gone.
Slowly, carefully, Jayme retraced her steps and returned to the entrance. When she was no longer afraid of having to spend hours stuck in the maze, waiting for the Izad caretakers to perform the evening sensor sweep, she groaned and leaned her head against the cool stone. She had been so patient! All she wanted was for Moll to see that she had been loyal, that she cared about the things Moll cared about. She would do whatever it took for Moll to give them a chance, just one, to see if they belonged together.
“Arrgh!” Jayme exclaimed, giving the wall a swift kick.
The stone gave under her foot, and there was a soft “phwatt!”as a small chunk of the decorated wall landed in the layers of rock dust on the floor.
Jayme instinctively glanced around, hoping no one had seen it. But the room was empty, as were the next ones. She bent down and picked up the round object, turning it over in her hand. It was a beaked face of some sort, broken off behind the ears. On the wall, there was a ragged spot between two other beak‑faces where it used to belong.
She tried to put it back in place but it wouldn’t stay. Then voices came from the maze behind her and she stuffed the head into her pouch, backing up as a handful of laughing tourists emerged from the narrow slit.
“You know the way back to the hostel?” a Bolian female asked Jayme.
Jayme couldn’t begin to explain, but she could backtrack the path she and Moll had taken. She felt like one of the obliging Izad guides, silently leading a group of chattering tourists through assembly halls where political theory had been argued tens of thousands of years ago.
When Jayme emerged from the ruins, Bobbie Ray was seated at a courtyard table, sipping from a tall bulb of something icy‑pink. His blue‑and‑yellow‑striped sunshade was tied to the back of his chair at a rakish angle, protecting his bulk from the harsh sun.
When he saw Jayme trailing disconsolately back to the hostel, he called her over. “Look what I found!” Bobbie Ray held up a small ceramic figure about thirty centimeters high, painted a ruddy orange. “It’s a genuine Kurlan Naiskos. And it only cost twoslips of latinum.”
It only took one look for Jayme to dismiss the statue. “The Kurls made Naiskos. That’s on Kurl–a different planet in another solar system, in case you hadn’t noticed.”
“Oh.” Bobbie Ray glanced at his Naiskos. “My mother will like it anyway.”
“Have you done anything but shop and drink with the other tourists?” Jayme demanded. “Haven’t you even set foot in the ruins?”
“Not yet,” Bobbie Ray said, quite pleased with himself.
“Excuse me?” a small voice inquired.
Jayme turned to see an Izad standing slightly out of arm’s reach, hands folded in supplication, as usual. There were far more Izad than Rahm–they were the cleaners, servants, cooks, attending to the needs of the tourists and caring for the ruins.
“Yes?” Jayme asked, surprised to be addressed by one.
“You have something that doesn’t belong to you?”
“Oh!” Jayme scrambled with her waist bag. “I was going to give this to someone.”
The Izad silently held out its hand and accepted the beaked head. Its fingers caressed the head like it knew every chiseled crevice.
Bobbie Ray raised one brow at Jayme. “Stealing the artifacts, Cadet Miranda?”
“Stealing? No!” Jayme appealed to the solemn‑faced Izad. “I was going to give it back. I hope I didn’t ruin it. It was an accident. . . .”
The Izad glanced at the beaked head, then silently turned and walked away.
“I was going to return it,” Jayme told Bobbie Ray before he could say another word. “I couldn’t just leave it lying on the floor in there. I had to bring it back to give it to someone, didn’t I?”
Bobbie Ray made a show of removing his Naiskos from the table and tucking it safely back in his bag. “Sure, Jayme, sure.”
The next day, Moll Enor invited Bobbie Ray to come on the tour of the underwater ruins. Jayme almost choked when he blithely agreed.
Wiping her mouth, she said, “It’s under water, Bobbie Ray. Water, as in, we’re underneath it.”
He daintily stuck an enormous piece of meat pie into his mouth. With his mouth full, he said, “I don’t care, as long as I’m not inthe water.”
Moll could tell that Jayme took perverse joy in the change in Bobbie Ray’s self‑satisfied expression once the tour‑bubble began to sink underwater. The forcefield held back the green sea, but you could poke your finger through and feel how warm it was. Bobbie Ray shuddered as Jayme slowly shoved her entire hand through.
“It’ll break if you keep doing that,” he nervously chided her.
“Stay on dry land if you don’t want to get wet,” she retorted.