Quicksilver (10 page)

Coming out of the sunshine, it took my eyes a good five seconds to adjust. But once I’d blinked away the dazzle, I spotted Lindsey at once. She was leaning over the front desk, pressing an admission stamp onto a little girl’s hand, while her parents waited by the entrance gate for her to buzz them through.

“Hi,” I said. “I’m Niki. You have my phone? It’s an old Nokia, black with a silver keypad.”

“Oh—yes—wait a second. I’ll be right with you.” She pressed a button and waved the family through, then stooped and retrieved a bundle from beneath the counter. “Is this jacket yours as well?”

Green cotton canvas, folded into a neat square. “It’s my dad’s,” I said. “Thanks.” I dropped the old cell into my purse and shook out the coat, feeling its slight weight. “There wasn’t … a bag with it or anything?”

Lindsey shook her head. “Just what you have.”

I’d figured as much. So not only was Faraday gone, he’d taken the relay with him.

“Now what?” asked Milo, as I turned away. “You want to keep looking for him?”

I draped the coat over my arm, slowly smoothing out the folds. I didn’t really care who had the relay, as long as it didn’t fall into the wrong hands. And I trusted Sebastian, even if he was annoying. If he said he was going to destroy the relay, then that was what he would do.

“There’s no point,” I said. “He knows what he’s doing, or at least he thinks he does. He’ll come back when he’s ready.”

“Or maybe he won’t,” said Milo, watching me sidelong. “Are you okay with that?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” I asked, and then I realized what he was implying. “Oh, no. No
way
. And also, ew.”

“Well, you seemed to know each other pretty well…”

“Ew,”
I repeated fervently.

Milo grinned. “Okay, okay. Just checking—” He broke off, staring at something in the air behind me. “What is that?”

I turned, following the line of his gaze past the front desk and into the atrium, where a crowd was watching a demonstration. The children bounced and squealed, while the adults gazed up toward the ceiling, heads swiveling in unison…

Then I saw it. A miniature flying machine, small enough to fit in my two hands. It hummed low over the audience, flipped over, and shot straight upward, out of sight.

All thought of Sebastian Faraday evaporated from my mind. I dug into my purse for the admission fee, shoved it across the counter to Lindsey, and slapped my hand down for the stamp.

“Hey, wait for me!” said Milo. The gate buzzed open and the two of us shot through, straining for a view of the little machine. It paused in midair and executed a triple flip, then dropped six feet before pulling up to another hovering stop.

“That is so cool,” Milo murmured. “I want one.”

I did too, but I was pretty sure it hadn’t come from the gift shop. X-shaped, with a propeller on all four spokes and a microprocessor wired into a superlight body, it had the unpolished look of a home electronics project rather than some prepackaged kit. As the machine went through its radio-controlled paces, I looked around for the maker.

And there he was on the far side of the atrium, a stocky, bespectacled man with thinning hair and a goatee. An LED name tag that said “Make!” was clipped to his shirt pocket
,
and he clutched a control box in both hands. I slipped around the edge of the circle and came up behind him.

“Hi,” I said to the man. “That’s a quadrotor drone, right?” “Yep,” he said absently, thumbing the controls. The drone flipped over again.

“And you built it yourself?”

The quadrotor’s battery was draining, and the propellers had begun to sputter. The man scurried forward and caught it as the crowd broke into applause. “Thanks for watching!” he called. “Check out our information table before you go!” Then he ambled off, my question apparently forgotten.

Annoyed by the dismissal, I watched as he packed the quadrotor away in its case and carried it toward the exit. There beneath a poster reading GET EXCITED AND MAKE THINGS stood a table covered with refrigerator magnets and brochures—all bearing a logo I recognized.

My heart did a 180. I chased after the man and tapped his elbow. “Wait a minute,” I said. “You’re from the makerspace?”

“That’s right,” he said, thick brows rising. “You’ve heard of us?”

“There was an article in the newspaper,” I said, as Milo strolled to join us. “It sounds fantastic. Is that where you built the quadrotor?”

“Uh, yeah.” His poise seemed to have deserted him. His eyes skittered past mine and focused on Milo, as if looking for reassurance.

“How long did it take you to build?” asked Milo.

That opened the floodgates. Immediately the man relaxed and started expounding on the schematics he’d used and all the challenges he’d had to overcome in the construction process, popping the case back open and pointing to one part of the machine after another as he talked. By the time he’d finished, Milo looked slightly dazed, but I’d seen as much as I needed to know.

“You should see what the guys down at the University of Pennsylvania are doing with these things,” the man went on eagerly, still talking to Milo. “They’ve got ‘em flying in formation, building towers, even playing instruments. They make great surveillance cameras too. Totally the next big thing in military tech.”

“So if I wanted to visit the makerspace sometime,” I said to the man, “would I be able—”

“Oh, sure, always looking for new members.” He fished a brochure out of his back pocket and handed it to Milo. “You should come to one of our Open House nights. We just bought a laser cutter, and we’ve got some great projects in the works right now.”

Never mind that I was the one who knew what a quadrotor was, the one who’d shown all the interest. All it had taken was one not-very-technical question from Milo, and suddenly
he
was the potential recruit? Seething behind my smile, I said in my perkiest tone, “Thanks. That was super interesting,” and watched the man trot away.

0 1 0 0 1 0

“Wow,” Milo said, as the two of us left the museum. “That was some fine sarcasm back there. Too bad he didn’t notice.”

I sighed. “Like it would have made a difference if he had. You’re the one he was interested in. He probably thinks I liked his quadrotor because it reminded me of a butterfly.”

“And he probably thinks I’m going into engineering because I’m Korean,” said Milo dryly.

Hope fluttered in my chest. “You are?”

He snorted a laugh. “Are you kidding? I can barely keep my bike from falling apart.”

Stupid, to feel disappointed. But for a moment I’d thought that Milo and I might actually have something good in common. “Oh,” I said.

“You are, though.” He stuffed his hands into his pockets, a smile curling his mouth. “And you’re going to blow all the guys in your class away.”

“With my beauty and charm?” I said ironically. “Thanks, but I don’t think their standards are going to be that high.”

Milo’s smile inverted to a look of reproach. “I’m not talking about your looks. I mean you’re going to be better than they are.”

“Oh really?” I kept my tone light, but an uneasy feeling was fizzling in my stomach. I hadn’t realized I’d given so much away. “What makes you think so?”

“Well, your bedroom, for one thing. I know there was a lot happening last night, but I did notice you had a pretty sweet automated system there. So you’re obviously smart. And I thought that flying machine was cool, but when you saw it, you just—” He spread his fingers in a firework gesture. “I’ve never seen you so excited about anything.”

I could feel a blush sneaking across my face. I pretended to look in a shop window, though I didn’t really need any new handbags or shoes. “So what are you going into, then?” I asked.

“Guess,” said Milo, and now he sounded resigned, even faintly bitter. It took me a second to process that, but then I got it: whatever his chosen major was, it wasn’t something his family approved of. Either because it wasn’t challenging enough, or prestigious enough, or it just wasn’t the traditional Korean thing to do.

I stepped back and looked Milo over. Good running shoes—
quality
running shoes, not just the brand everybody else was wearing, and well broken in. Slim jeans in a classic style. Navy T-shirt with a Nike swoosh across the chest, just visible behind the zip of his dark olive windbreaker.

All of which could mean any number of things or nothing in particular. But I’d also seen Milo in short sleeves, effortlessly stacking water cooler refills and 20-kilogram bags of cat litter, and I knew what his arms looked like.

“Something athletic,” I began, and his face lit up. I almost said
ballet
or
figure skating
just to see how he’d react, but I’d seen his work schedule and there was no way he had time for lessons. Besides, he didn’t move like a dancer.

“Phys ed,” I announced. “You’re going to be a gym teacher. Or a coach. Or a personal trainer.”

“Technically, that was three guesses,” said Milo, but now his eyes were smiling along with his mouth, and I knew I’d got it right the first time. “What gave it away?”

“You don’t get biceps like that from reading textbooks,” I said. “And no offense, but apart from the earbuds, you don’t seem like the artsy type.”

“Tell that to my grandmother,” he said. “She’s the reason I had to suffer through ten years of Suzuki violin.” He mimed bowing and made a screechy noise. “But yeah, you’re right. I’m okay at math and science and business and that other traditional stuff, but I don’t want to spend my life in an office. I like running. I like the outdoors. And … ” He gave a little shrug. “I like kids.”

Now that I’d put the pieces together, it made sense. I could see Milo being good with children, and I could see them liking him too. But kids were one of the things I didn’t talk about, because I was never going to have any. So I just said, “Well, good for you. I’m sure you’ll be great at it.”

“Tell that to my mom,” he said wryly. “Or better yet don’t, because I haven’t figured out how to break the news to her yet. She knows I’m into sports, but she thinks that just means I’m going to become an orthopedic surgeon and work on top athletes. The kind of thing that will show everybody how brilliant and hard working I am, and make lots of money.” He gazed into the distance, dark eyes wistful behind his glasses. “When she finds out I got accepted at Laurentian, she’s going to flip out.”

“Laurentian!” I hadn’t meant to sound dismayed, but it just slipped out. Laurentian University was in Sudbury, my old hometown. “Why there?”

“They’ve got a great phys ed program, that’s why. I applied to Nipissing and Windsor too, but Laurentian was my first choice.” He cocked his head at me. “Why, does it matter?”

“No,” I said quickly. “I just—wasn’t expecting it.”

Milo looked about to say something more, but then a whistle blew shrilly from his pocket. “Probably my mom,” he said, taking his phone out. He frowned at the screen for three seconds, then put it away. “Sorry. You were saying?”

I wouldn’t have suspected anything if not for the slight catch in his voice. But I’d been reading people too long, and I knew Milo too well by now, not to pick up on it. “What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Nothing!” His eyes opened wide. “Why?”

I held out my hand. “Give me the phone, Milo.”

“Excuse me?”

“Sebastian just texted you, didn’t he? I want to know what he said.”

He deflated. “How’d you guess?”

I snatched at his pocket, but he spun away, catching my shoulder and holding me at arm’s length. His grip was gentle, but his muscles were like steel. “Hey! What if I told you it was none of your business?”

“It’s to do with me. That makes it my business,” I snapped, trying to duck under his arm. He grabbed my other shoulder, holding me steady.

“All right, calm down. I didn’t want to scare you, okay? And I’m guessing Sebastian didn’t either.” He let go and pulled out his phone, turning the face toward me. The message read:

–Niki’s in danger. You’re not. Stay close to her, please. I’ll be back as soon as I can.

0 1 0 0 1 1

We texted back right away, of course. I had a million things I wanted to say to Sebastian, most of them rude—what kind of idiotic, useless, high-handed message was that?—but Milo talked me down, pointing out that we’d get more out of him if he thought the conversation was private. So I let him try first:

–What kind of danger? What am I supposed to do?

After we’d waited twenty minutes and sent a couple more messages for good measure, it was obvious we weren’t going to get any answer. He’d sent the text from an online service, probably using one of the computers at the library, and moved on without waiting for a reply.

“Maybe he’ll get back to us later,” said Milo. But he didn’t sound optimistic, and I wasn’t either. Sebastian’s last message hadn’t read like the start of a conversation. It was more like a good-bye.

“Jerk,” I muttered, but my heart wasn’t in it. I kept thinking about the way Sebastian had looked back in the diner when I called him a coward—that flicker of guilt and, for one second, anger…

I’d never bothered to turn on the charm for Sebastian; he’d seen too much of the real me to be fooled. Besides, he was already on my side, for reasons that had nothing to do with my winning personality, so I didn’t need to tiptoe around him.

Or so I’d thought. But now I was beginning to regret needling him about Alison. Sure, their relationship made no sense to me, but it was also none of my business…

Though if Sebastian had decided he’d rather take off and leave me in some unspecified danger than tell me why he hadn’t called his girlfriend, then he really was a jerk.

As we walked, the sun disappeared behind the clouds and the wind swirled along the sidewalk, kicking up little tornadoes of grit and paper scraps. The empty storefronts suddenly looked menacing, dark windows staring us down, and the scattered tattoo parlors, bars, and used bookshops were no better. I pulled my dad’s coat around my shoulders.