Shades of Earth (11 page)

17:
AMY

I would use the same word
to describe both my joy and the rain:
torrential
.
This—
this—
this is all I ever wanted from the world: wide-open spaces and cooling rain and the chance to
run
.

We reach the buildings much too soon.

The Earthborns, grumbling at the rain they see as a nuisance more than anything else, stagger into the first buildings. The shipborns are panicked, but not so panicked that they're willing to share space with the people from Earth. They race past the closest buildings, the ones the Earthborns chose, then pour into the ones behind the first row, packing each building so tight that there's only room for them to stand as they watch the rain stream down over the walls.

I stop, letting the rain wash over me, and Elder watches me, bemused. I squint through the rain, trying to see the buildings clearly. They are
ancient
, far older than anything I've ever seen before. They remind me of the cave dwellings at Mesa Verde, the way they pop straight up out of the stone of the hill.

“Find shelter!” Emma shouts as she runs past me. She and the military are going to each building, checking them, trying to make sure that everyone's arrived safely.

Elder starts to pull me toward the closest building—the one packed with dozens of shipborns all standing, shivering together.

“Let's go this way,” I say, pulling him in the other direction. It seems stupid to cram together with others when there's so much
space
here. So many empty buildings, with rain darkening their pale, dusty exteriors. Elder hesitates, but I slip my fingers through his, and he grips my hand in reply.

We climb the stone steps to the next level. The buildings are nearly all two stories high, with the second story smaller than the first, making a square deck. The path is paved with large, flat rocks and is as wide as a country road—a small car might be able to squeeze between the buildings if it weren't for all the stairs, but two people can easily walk side by side.

Lightning flashes.

The buildings all look hollow inside, dark, and despite the fact that there is no glass in the window or doors at the entrances, the air inside feels musty and stale. The gaping maws of the doorways remind me of monsters' mouths. And suddenly I don't want to go farther. I don't want to be here at all. Because these houses are the perfect size for people, but we're supposed to be the only people on this planet.

When I stop, Elder tugs at my arm, pulling me into the nearest building. “This happened often on Sol-Earth?” he asks as another roll of thunder bursts out overhead.

I grin at him. “Not all the time, but it happened,” I say. “Isn't it great?”

Elder looks at me as if I've completely lost it.

“At least it'll be cooler after the rain,” I add. “On Earth, in the summer, it'd get really hot, and then there would be a quick thunderstorm. This must be Centauri-Earth's summertime.”

“So summer is a time of terrifying thunder and fire
from the sky
?”

I laugh, but when I see Elder's serious, I bite it back. “Not usually, no. Trust me, it'll be over soon. And it's not dangerous, not really.”

To prove it, I step through the doorway again, twirling in the rain. I tilt my head back, looking up as the drops falls down, spinning fast on the slick stones.

Elder catches me before I fall.

The rain pours down. We're both soaked, and the rain is falling so hard that I can feel it in my scalp.

“This is loons!” Elder shouts over the downpour. “We need to get inside!” He tugs on my arm, trying to pull me into the shelter of the closest building, but I tug back, pulling him closer to me.

Another flash of this lightning. The world illuminates for just a split second—I can see each glittering drop of rain as it falls—and then another huge
crash!
of thunder.

I don't think anymore, I don't feel. I don't have time to be gentle or shy.

I just kiss him.

My lips press against his, my arms weave around him until we are so close that even the raindrops don't slip between us. My fingers tangle in his hair, then slide down the back of his neck. His arms tense, tightening his hold around me, pulling me closer, closer.

All my senses burst into life: the feel of cool rain, the thunder cracking overhead ringing in my ears, but it's all overwhelmed by the sense of Elder filling every pore of my being.

I see, through my closed eyes, another flash of lightning. It electrifies me—and Elder. He kisses me with passion that can only be described as voracious. I clutch at him the same way he clutches me: with a feeling of need, of longing, of insatiableness.

Always in the rain
.

I stand on my tiptoes to reach Elder's lips better, but I lose balance, slipping on the wet stones. Elder's grip on me is so tight, though, that he easily lifts me from the ground, spinning in a slow circle, his laughter weaving in between raindrops to splash against my heart.

* * *

I shiver, my rain-darkened hair hanging down in clumps as the downpour ends as abruptly as it began. Already the sky is lightening, the air cooler. I lean back, blinking in the soft light of the twin suns.

“What is it?” Elder asks, and it's only then that I realize I've sighed aloud.

“I was sort of hoping for a rainbow,” I say.

He stops dead and shoots me an incredulous look. “Those are frexing
real?
”

I laugh. “Of course they are!”

Elder shakes his head, as if trying to make the idea of colors arching across the sky stick in his brain.

Up here on the second level of buildings, it almost feels as if we have a semblance of privacy. The rain has brought not just cooler air, but also a sheen of freshness to the whole world.

And insects.

I swat at a gnat—or something very like a gnat—buzzing around my face, then notice a subtle humming made by the bugs nearby. I wander along the wall of the building and find a tree, like the ones in the forest but smaller, with a swarm of gnat-like bugs hovering over beautiful, delicate purple flowers dripping from the tree branches.

I reach out to touch the petals, but then a screech cuts through the air—a high-pitched scream that fades to silence, then circles back around. I pull my hand back, instinctively wanting to protect myself even though I know I can't.

“What was that?” Elder asks in a low voice, but we both know what it was. We scan the skies but see nothing. Elder steps closer to the sprawling tree. “I think . . . I think these flowers came from that stringy stuff that was on the trees earlier.”

He's right—the purple Spanish-moss-like plants that clung to the trees are the same shade as the flower petals, a delicate lilac on the edges that sinks to deep purple in the center. A few tendrils of the moss haven't blossomed, but most have unraveled, twirling into paper-thin, almost-translucent flowers. “They're lovely,” I breathe.

“You like the flowers?” Elder asks, a wry smile on his lips. Before I can respond, he reaches up and plucks one from the branches of the closest tree. “Here you go. Least I could do, after I made such a mess of the last time I brought you flowers.”

I look at him curiously—when did he last bring me flowers?—and then I bend my face down to breathe in the intoxicating sticky-sweet scent of the flower.

I smile. “It reminds me of—”

 

My body goes numb.

 

My eyes are still open as I fall. The ground rushes toward me, but I cannot put my hands down to protect my face, I cannot tense as my body impacts against the ground.

I feel nothing.

My eyes are still open as I lie, facedown, in a pool of muddy rainwater. I can see swirls of dirt and brown. Something sticks to my eyes, and some reflex takes over as my eyelids flutter shut.

 

Water seeps into my slightly open mouth and up my nose and trickles into one ear.

 

I try to shout, I try to move, but I can't, and it's just like when I was frozen, and I'm trapped again, and I can't move, I can't, I can't, and I have to breathe,
I have to breathe
, but there's no air, just water, and I am screaming inside my head to
not breathe
but the only things that work are my involuntary functions like my heart that's beating too fast and my lungs that have to breathe.

And then there's air.

 

And then there's nothing.

18:
ELDER

Amy's voice drops off suddenly.
Her eyes roll back in her head, and she falls to the ground, limp. For one moment I watch with horror as she lies facedown in a puddle. Little bubbles burst on the puddle's surface, then the thin layer of water is still.

“Amy?” I say, dropping to my knees beside her. “Amy!”

I roll her out of the water and swipe the water off her face. “Amy?” I shake her shoulders, but her head lolls lifelessly. “AMY!”

Nothing. Dirty water dribbles out of her mouth. I push against her chest, and more water leaks out, but she doesn't move. Her breathing is shallow but steady. Carefully, I peel back her eyelids. No response.

My heart's racing, my ears are ringing. What happened? Is she—

I press my head against her chest. No. Thank the stars, no. She has a heartbeat.

Frex! What should I do?

I scoop Amy up in my arms. I need help.
Now.

I stumble down the stairs, shouting for Kit. She can't be that far behind. People in the other buildings peer through the windows and doors carved out of the stone walls. When they see me holding Amy's unconscious form, they gasp or scream, curse or blanch, but none of them are Kit, none of them know medicine, none of them can save her.

“KIT!” I bellow.

Someone tall and dark turns the corner—Emma, on patrol duty with Juliana Robertson. “Help!” I shout at them. Even Juliana, who wanted nothing but to fight me earlier, is worried, her face draining of color, a stark contrast to her dark, bushy hair.

From behind them, Kit comes running. She stops short when she sees Amy. “What happened?” she gasps.

“Help her!” I shout again.

“This way,” Emma says as she and Juliana take off at a run toward the buildings at the edge of the ruin, where the Earthborns are. I race after them, slipping on the wet stone pavers. I twist to protect Amy's lifeless body, gouging a long scrape into my thigh that I barely feel. Kit helps me up, then runs beside me, already checking Amy's pulse as we jog toward the outer buildings.

Emma and Juliana lead us straight to the first stone building in the row, the one that's slightly bigger than the rest, and moments later, Colonel Martin emerges. “What the hell happened?” he bellows, striding toward us. I don't stop. I need doctors, medicine, something. Colonel Martin takes one look at Amy's pale, unresponsive face and curses long and loud, running beside me, shouting for assistance.

“Stand back!” he bellows once I duck into the building. Amy's mother screams. I kneel, carefully laying Amy down on the cold stone floor.

“What happened?” Dr. Martin cries as she stares at her daughter's motionless body. Kit kneels beside Amy, lifting her eyelids. Two other people—a female with narrow eyes and a short man—drop down beside Amy and take over. Earthborn doctors.

“Where's Gupta?” Colonel Martin shouts. “Where is he? He's the lead medic!”

“I don't know,” the female Earthborn doctor says.

“What happened?” Dr. Martin wails again.

“I don't know,” I say, my words coming out as a plea. “We were just up there, at the buildings, and there was a tree, and—”

“Could be anything,” the Earthborn doctor says. His accent is strange, stranger than Amy's, but that knowledge just makes my chest ache. “There was rain—perhaps there's a toxin in the precipitation. Or a bug bite.”

“Bugs! There were lots of bugs, little annoying flying things,” I jump in.

The doctor nods. “Perhaps a venom that reacted strangely to her system. Anything out here, no matter how seemingly harmless, is alien to us. We don't know how we'll react to any stimuli on this planet.”

“What's this?” Kit asks, lifting Amy's limp hand. The sticky remains of the purple flower petals still cling to her palm.

“A flower. She sniffed a flower and then—”

“Passed out?” Kit lifts Amy's eyelids, but much more gently than I did earlier, and shines a light in them.

I nod.

“Well, wake her up!” Colonel Martin shouts.

The Sol-Earth doctor presses a stethoscope into Amy's chest.

“You!” Colonel Martin rounds on me. His wife gives a tiny sound of fear. “You put her in this danger!” Colonel Martin's accusations slice into me, ripping my flesh to shreds.

“I don't know what's wrong with her,” the Earthborn female doctor mutters.

“Where the hell is Dr. Gupta?” Colonel Martin shouts. His gaze zeros in on Juliana Robertson. “You! Go find that lazy medic and bring him here!”

I reach for Amy—I know she can't hear or see me, I just want to touch her—and Colonel Martin slams both hands into my chest, throwing me to the far wall of the building.

“Get. The hell. Out.” He grinds the words out through clenched teeth.

I stare up at him, shocked at his reaction.

“You did this. If she dies, her blood is on
your
hands. You can't keep her safe. You can't keep anyone safe. GET OUT.” He pushes me again, and I stumble against the wall. Kit looks up—the only other shipborn in the room—but she can't afford to divert her attention from Amy.

I drink in the image of Amy—pale, empty, lifeless on the ground. Her mother, weeping. Colonel Martin's rage.

I run from the building, Colonel Martin's accusation digging into my heart like a salted blade.