"Other ways to fight?"

"Well, maybe not fight, but to get something done. We don't fight when we steal fruit and crops."

"We don't want to draw attention to ourselves," Mig said. "Wouldn't bother me much to take a few of them murderers out, though!"

Krys nodded. He felt the same way, but he knew it was pointless. "This is all so stupid," Krys muttered. "We weren't hurting anyone! Why couldn't they just take over peaceful? We'd sell crops to anyone, wouldn't we?"

Mig frowned and then nodded. "I expect we would," he admitted. "But that's the thing of it: they don't want to buy them. They expect us to give them away, then they give us back what they feel we should need."

"That's not right!" Krys said. "We grew them; they belong to us, not someone else!"

Mig patted the air with his hand to signal Krys to calm down. "Yes, son, I know, but that's the thing people don't understand. If they won't fight to protect what they got, then what's to stop someone else from thinking they can have it?"

"It's not right!"

"But we can't fight back with only eight of us and hundreds of them."

"And they've got soldiers and that robot."

Mig nodded. "I heard about them when I served but never saw one. At least nothing like that. We had some early prototypes but they were slow and broke down a lot."

"Well, these didn't look slow," Krys pointed out. "One almost squashed me in the woods!"

"Bigger they are, the harder they fall," Mig grunted. "Trick is figuring out how to knock one down!"

"Let me guess, that's why we're training?" Krys ventured.

Mig chuckled. "Just like my Lily, smart as a whip."

Krys shook his head. "Nobody's that smart, Mr. Strain. Lily's something else."

Mig sighed and turned away. He cleared his throat and spoke in a brusque voice. "She is, son, but stop distracting me. Let's see to figuring out some things we can do if one of them big tin cans is chasing us."

"Um, sir?"

"Hmm?"

Krys swallowed before pointing out, "You keep calling me, 'son.'"

Mig blinked as he stared down at him. "So I do. I meant no disrespect to your father. Just felt natural is all. Won't happen again."

"No!" Krys blurted out. He winced and slowed down. "I mean, it's okay. I, um, I think my dad would be okay with it."

"Is that right?"

Krys nodded. "I am," he added. "I mean, um, Lily told me about my mom and hers talking about us."

Mig chuckled and his eyes glistened. "So they did. Seemed to think the two of you were made for each other."

"Lily had dreams and plans for herself. Things she wanted to do."

"That she did. She was a dreamer."

"I never thought about it much. Lily did enough of that for both of us," Krys admitted. "But she always had me in her dreams with her. She always made a place for me."

"Did that bug you?"

Krys shook his head. "No. Matter of fact, when I thought about it, I never imagined a life without her in it."

Mig stepped up and pulled Krys in for a quick hug. He sniffed and turned away. "All right, quit stalling! We got some work to do if we're going to be ready when the resistance starts up!"

"Resistance?"

"Don't you worry; it won't be long before somebody realizes what's going on. Maybe the old ways weren't the best but this new crap won't last. People have a need to be responsible for themselves."

Krys wasn't exactly sure what Mig was talking about but he nodded anyhow. It sounded good, at least, and Krys couldn't imagine having something that he used and took care of, but it didn't belong to him. He frowned. "All right, let's train."

Mig grinned. "Imagine you got one of them robots chasing you-how are you going to get away?"

Krys considered hiding under a fallen tree, but he'd been lucky he hadn't been stepped on. "Maybe running away isn't the answer?"

Mig raised an eyebrow. "Bold. I like it. Keep talking, son, and let's see how we can make this happen!"

Chapter 11.

Lily emerged from her tiny bedroom and caught sight of Kami walking towards her. Lily smiled and raised her hand but not before Kami turned and ducked into her room. Lily hesitated, staring at the door that slid shut behind her, and then started to notice the other girls walking in the hallway who were staring at her.

"Hey Lily, what's up?"

Lily spun and saw Treya, a fourteen-year-old who had been taken from a colony south of hers. She offered a smile and then glanced at Kami's door again. "Nothing, I guess. I was just on my way to class."

"Great job on your tests," Treya said. "Who knew a farmer's kid could be so smart?"

Lily frowned. "What's that mean?"

The other girl's eyes widened. "I'm sorry, it was a joke."

"Oh, um, okay." Lily blushed. "Guess I'm not so smart after all."

Treya smiled again and tucked her hair behind her ear. They all wore the same hairstyle now, with it cut to a length that was just below their jaw. Lily let hers fall where it wanted most of the time; she had better things to worry about than how her hair looked. "Don't worry, we're all new here. Besides, my family were fishermen; it's not like I've got any room to talk!"

Lily fell in beside her and tried to keep up with the people waving and greeting her as she walked with Treya towards her classroom. Their conversation was limited by interruptions and when Lily arrived at her class, she realized they hadn't really said anything useful at all. Some talk about what they liked and what the future might hold, but nothing about what they'd left behind. She walked into her class and took her seat, feeling like something was missing.

"Hey, Lil," Trix greeted her from the seat behind her.

"Hi," Lily responded on autopilot.

"Uh oh, what's wrong?"

Lily's breath caught in her throat. She glanced at the instructor who was waiting for class to start. She couldn't talk about her missing family and friends; they'd been told repeatedly to look to the future of humanity, not to the past. The past was where mistakes were made. "Just worried about Kami," she said instead of facing her own troubles. "I tried to catch her in the hall but she ignored me and shut herself in her room."

"Oh. Well, she's been kind of feeling bad lately. First, um, you know, what happened, and then she didn't do so good on her tests."

"So? That doesn't mean I don't want to be her friend," Lily said.

Trix sighed. "You're special, Lily."

"Stop it! I am not."

"Come on, Lil, look at what you did! You're like a genius or something."

"No I'm not."

"Then how did you do so good? I know you're hearing the same rumors I am-you're rated the highest on the station-on all the stations-because you're only fourteen."

"So what," Lily argued. "A lot can change."

Trix ignored her protests. "How did you learn all that stuff? Those tests were hard!"

"I don't know. Krys's mom made learning fun for us. That and the rest of it I figured out. I didn't get everything right. I mean, there was a lot of stuff I guessed or just didn't know. Maybe I just got lucky?"

Trix rolled her eyes. "Yeah, sure you did. Lucky every time. I don't think so."

Lily slumped in her chair. "I don't want to be different."

"Hey, even if you are a freak, it's cool. I'll still be your friend."

Lily snorted. "Great."

"Hey!"

"No! I didn't mean anything bad! I meant the part about being a freak."

"I was just teasing."

Lily nodded and sighed. She opened her mouth when the teacher, Instructor Doleen, signaled for the door to shut and stood up to begin class. Lily spun around in her seat and focused on the teacher. They'd only been in class a few days so far but the lessons weren't nearly as much fun as they had been with Krys's mom. Although having Krys there with her to help her take her mind off things had helped, too.

"Young misses, before we begin I have a request for Miss Lily Strain to head to the administration office when class is over. Any questions?"

Lily sat upright and glanced around to see everyone staring at her. She felt her cheeks warm.

"Miss Strain?"

"Sorry, ma'am," Lily stammered. "No ma'am, no questions."

"Good, then let's move on to where we left off yesterday with advanced geometry."

Lily sank back in her seat and let her mind wander. Geometry was easy. Advanced geometry, according to Instructor Doleen, was what Lily had learned a couple of years ago while playing in the fields with her classmates. What really twisted her mind up for the remainder of the two-hour class was what kind of trouble she'd gotten herself in that required a trip to the administrative offices.

"Miss Strain?"

Lily jerked her head up. She'd been staring at the back of Candiss's neck. Candiss turned, as everyone else did, to look at her. Lily ignored them and saw the display the instructor had drawn the complex shape on. "It depends," she answered, barely remembering what Instructor Doleen had asked.

"No, it's a simple question," the instructor disagreed. "How many planes are there in this structure?"

"If it's just a two-dimensional image, then there's one," she began.

A few gasps greeted her answer. Her peers thought she was being difficult and were either excited or worried. She wasn't and opened her mouth to explain but Instructor Doleen spoke first. "That is a fault of the display. You know perfectly well this is not a two-dimensional object. Miss Strain, I'm very disappointed in you. I think some additional work might help you focus better and-"

"Instructor, I wasn't finished," Lily interrupted her. She ignored the rustling of her startled peers and pressed on. "Without seeing it fully, I can't tell how many planes it has. Are there additional vertices hidden behind the ones that are visible? And what if the side not facing me changes while I can't see it? The odds are unlikely, but it's still a remote possibility. Additionally, if we magnify it to atomic levels, there will be a different landscape on the surface and within, allowing for an order of complexity I can't begin to guess at. If we factor in-"

"That's enough!" the instructor barked. Lily snapped her lips shut while the instructor glared at her. "The correct answer is six sides. And you, young miss, are to escort yourself to the administrative offices immediately."

Lily felt her cheeks burning as she gathered her infopad and stood up. She glanced down at it and then started tapping on it with one hand. Instructor Doleen's eyes narrowed as she stared at her. The uneven polyhedron on the display rotated and flipped over, gaining color on each side of the shape as it did so. It continued to rotate until the first side was back facing them, except it had changed by sporting an additional edge along the middle. It kept going, morphing as it twisted until the shape resembled a cat.

"Miss Strain!" Instructor Doleen snapped at her. "That is enough!"

Lily tapped her pad again. The cat tucked into itself and rolled over, shifting back into the original shape that everyone saw now bore a startling resemblance to a sleeping cat with its head and tail tucked against itself.

"Office. Now!"

"Yes, ma'am," Lily said and turned smartly on her heels to walk to the door of the classroom. She paused and glanced back at the glowering woman.

"A cat, really?" the instructor huffed.

"Sorry, Instructor Doleen," Lily said. "My boyfriend used to tell me stories about a cat that could walk through walls."

Lily turned and slipped out the door before the face of her instructor could grow any redder.

Chapter 12.

"Miss Strain, please have a seat."