Lily sighed. She didn't want to get anyone in trouble but she couldn't stop thinking about it. "I heard somebody say it. They weren't talking to me, just about me."

Palla grunted. "Okay, that makes sense."

"It does?"

Palla smiled. "See, I can still be your mentor after all!"

"Not if you don't help me understand it," Lily pointed out.

"Well, people don't always think with their heads."

"That's helpful," Lily said with a roll of her eyes.

Palla grinned. "Stop it. I mean, in this case, were they upset about something or did they just sound mean?"

Lily frowned and thought back to the snippet of conversation. "Upset, I guess."

"Well, there you go. People get wrapped up in things and lash out. They're trying to gain control over a situation. I know I've done it. Done it with you, in fact."

"Oh," Lily mumbled. She thought back to some of their confrontations and nodded. "Yeah, okay. Me too."

"See? You're not a stupid kid. You're smarter than most of the people on this station. Definitely smarter than whoever said that. He was just upset about something and scared."

"Scared?"

Palla nodded. "Scared of something he couldn't understand."

Lily looked down at herself and then back up. "What's not to understand?"

"A pretty young girl like you with so much potential who wants to get dirty and drive a giant robot?"

Lily shrugged. "So?"

Palla laughed. "Well, it takes some getting used to. Pretty girls are expected to do something that keeps them pretty, I guess."

"Not where I come from. Everybody works and you do whatever it is that needs to be done, not whatever you can do that won't chip a nail."

Palla burst out laughing. When she gained control of herself, she nodded. "That's why people are scared. Your ideas are so fresh and real they seem crazy."

Lily stared at her. "You're pretty-are you afraid to get dirty?"

Palla smiled and shook her head. "No, I'm not afraid of hard work. I'd rather not get dirty, but I'll do what I have to. Besides, I'm not that pretty."

Lily ignored Palla's attempt at a joke. "Are you scared?"

"Scared? Of what?"

"Of me."

"A little, maybe," she admitted. "I mean I was, but I'm not anymore. I didn't understand you."

"And now you do?"

Palla smiled. "Not entirely. But enough, I think. I know your heart and your head's in the right place. I think we've become friends, Lily. I hope good friends?"

Lily nodded. "I hope so too. I could use a friend. But be careful."

"Careful? Why?"

"My last friends got shot."

Palla winced. "I'm not worried. Besides, you're going to be a biomech pilot in no time. Nobody's going to mess with you or your friends when that happens!"

Lily felt the heat rush to her cheeks but she smiled and nodded in spite of it. She hoped Palla was right, and then maybe she could get the friend she missed the most back at her side. She'd be able to protect him and make sure nothing bad ever happened to them again.

Chapter 29.

Krys walked through the cold drizzle and shivered. He had no right to complain; usually this far into the night cycle, snow was falling instead of rain. There was a little over a veek left until sunrise. Thirteen days, or maybe twelve now. He'd lost track of time, trying to figure out what was wrong with the tank.

He looked up from the ground as he approached his tiny house and saw someone waiting outside, under the tiny overhang that served as a porch. It wasn't someone: it was her. Shelby. No, not Shelby: Lieutenant Riggs.

"I forget to fix something?" Krys growled as he walked up to her.

"Krys! That's not-"

"Then what?" He stopped in front of her and stood in the rain. "I'd like to go inside."

She sighed and stepped out of the way. "Can I come in?"

"Didn't think I had a choice," he said as he stepped up and pressed his hand against the biometric panel beside his door. It chirped and slid open to let him enter. He held it for her without knowing why. She was the commander of the colony-her print would open anything. Then again, his would do almost the same thing since he'd been promoted to the colony's resident technical specialist.

Or as he referred to it after reading an ancient text he found before the rebellion, a morlock. He kept the machines running so the happy people in charge could live their lives uninterrupted.

"You're obviously still mad at me," she stated after she stepped in. Before Krys could give her the verbal equivalent of a kick in the face, she continued. "Did you ever stop and think about how I felt?"

Krys did stop. He stared at her and no matter how much he'd wanted to hurt her, he found himself thinking about her. About the woman in the armor who was hidden behind reflective material. The woman who had seen him running and terrified and instead of making her life easier by shooting him or letting someone else shoot him, she'd hidden him and kept him safe.

The same woman who had kept him out of sight and busy while she had three other chances to ship him off Venus to a reeducation center. She hadn't told him about the two of the three ships but he'd found out anyhow. Other people liked to talk and Krys did a good job of asking the right questions or learning when to not ask anything at all and listen instead.

"Why?" Krys asked her.

"Why should you ask me?"

He shook his head. "No, I mean why do you help me?"

"Because you were just a kid in the wrong place at the wrong time," she began.

"I still am," he said before he could stop himself.

She shook her head. "No, this is your place. And you're not much of a kid anymore."

He snorted. "I'm fifteen!"

She shrugged. "So? You act older than a lot of people here do. And you're smart. I see you watching and learning. I ask myself sometimes if we captured you, or if you captured us."

Krys snorted again but didn't respond. His head was spinning now that he knew she was keeping her eye on him and had noticed him trying to gather as much intelligence as he could. He didn't have any plans, but someday-hopefully someday soon-he might. He jerked his head up to meet her eyes. "That's why you asked if I knew anything?"

She nodded.

"What if I had?"

She stared at him and then glanced away. "You didn't."

"No, but what if I had?"

She turned her head back to him. "I have a job to do, Krys. A job I don't always like."

"Quit."

She stopped and stared at him before she shook her head. She let out a sad chuckle. "I can't quit. Nobody can. I could put in for a transfer or reassignment, but to do what? This is what I'm best at."

"What do you mean you can't quit? Of course you can!"

She shook her head. "This is our life. Our world. Our everything, now. We're part of something greater. Our entire civilization. We each do our part and help us to become more. If we don't, if we refuse, then we're betraying the people around us. Instead of being part of the solution, we're part of the problem."

Krys's eyes kept stretching as she talked. He couldn't imagine how that was possible. To be forced to do something he didn't like or...or...or else.

"You keep this to yourself, all right? Nobody else can ever know."

"Know what?" he mumbled.

"Know that I think what happened here is terrible. It made me sick to my stomach once I was alone and I didn't have to hold it together. Saving your life that day? That was the only thing that got me through. But then I never heard about you or saw you. I hoped, but I didn't know. I nearly gave up so many times, Krys. So many times I wanted it all to be over like a bad dream I wouldn't have to wake up from."

Krys watched her as she spilled her soul to him. Her eyes glistened with unshed tears and it made his chest and throat tighten.

"Hope," she whispered and then lifted her head a little. "Hope kept me going. When they brought you in, I dared to hope and then I recognized you. I made a difference. One life. One small life. That was enough. That made all my nightmares and guilt worth it."

Krys swallowed and glanced around. It was his house, more of a closet really, but he felt like a stranger. "Um, thanks?" he offered.

She blinked and then laughed. "Thanks?" she repeated before giggling some more. She wiped her eyes and smiled at him. "You're something else!"

"Well, I guess I don't really know what to say," he admitted. "I mean, this entire colony reports to you, and you're telling me you broke the rules to help me out. It's kind of messed up."

She nodded. "You have no idea. I keep telling myself that if I had a brother, I'd want him to be like you."

"What about a sister?"

"None that I know about."

"None that-what's that supposed to mean? How would you not know about them?"

Shelby frowned and nodded towards the table. "You've put in a lot of hours today. Why don't you have a seat and let me fix you something?"

"You want to fix me something?" Krys repeated.

She smiled. "Is that a bad thing?"

"I don't-"

She held up a hand and then pointed at the table. "Sit."

"Yes, ma'am," he said and sat down.

She went through the cooler and picked out some fresh vison meat and turned to the small modular cookbox beside it. She put the meat on a plate and programmed the device. She returned to the cooler and pulled out a pineapple and some packaged asparagus. "The benefit of living on Venus is the fresh food," she said while preparing the meal.

Krys nodded, even though it was all he'd ever known. He couldn't imagine living somewhere were the only food he had was processed, stale, or nearly synthetic with all the preservatives and artificial ingredients. "So about that family?" he asked.

She froze for a moment and then shrugged. "No family," she said.

"Why not? You had to at one point, didn't you? I mean, I get that in the rest of the colonized worlds, babies are planned and conceived medically up in optimized labs, but you had to have parents who wanted you."

She turned and glanced back at him. A sad smile flickered on her lips before she turned back to the cookbox. It chirped to indicate the small steak had finished cooking. She removed it and slid the vegetables in to prepare them separately while the steak sat. "There is a price for making the human race what it is today. A price that a lot of us are willing to pay."

Krys watched her as she kept her back to him. "Are? Or were? You seem to be having a lot of doubts."

She sighed. "You're way too young to be asking these kinds of questions."

"You started it. You said I act older than I am."

"Older than me," she muttered.

Krys raised an eyebrow and wasn't sure if he was supposed to hear her or not. "What's that mean?"

The cookbox chirped again, sparing her from answering. She removed the vegetables and moved to put the meal on the table in front of him. Sauteed asparagus, cubed pineapple, and fresh vison steak that was still steaming. Krys was distracted by the meal and felt his belly clench. He grabbed the silverware and, with a quick glance at Shelby, he dug in.

"Remember, Krys, what we talk about stays between us. No one else. Not now, not ever."

Krys glanced at her and nodded. He turned his attention back to his meal and cut another slice of meat free. When he glanced up again a few minutes later, he saw that Shelby had slipped out and left him alone. He paused and frowned. He had a long list of bizarre interactions with her but this one was the strangest yet. Was she really as confused and torn up as she claimed, or was she trying to make him think she was so she could pump him for information?

Krys frowned and glanced down at the half-eaten steak. He supposed it didn't matter as long as she could cook a mean steak!