thinks I came to take him up on that kiss—but only for a moment. The look on my face tells him otherwise.
“Em, what’s wrong?”
I think he’s hiding something, but I’m not sure. My father’s voice echoes through my head: Attack, attack, always attack.
“You lied in the meeting,” I say, letting him hear the anger in my soul even while I hope I’m wrong. “You already knew the Observatory had power.”
His mouth twitches, just once.
“I did,” he says.
I was right. I don’t want to be. I wanted to trust him.
“Did you remember your access code?”
He stares for a few seconds, his expression blank and impenetrable. He’s weighing his options: lie and see if he can get away with it, or tell the truth.
“I didn’t remember it, but I figured it out,” he says. “I thought maybe my progenitor picked a code of something important from his childhood. I’ve been working on it since I first found this room.”
I wait. There is more and he will tell me.
His stone-face cracks, shifts to sadness. He looks away.
“When I was little, I had a kitten,” he says. “I mean, he had a kitten. White, with a black spot on its face. They made him kill it. The kitten’s name was Chromium.”
I have no idea what to say. I’m excited and jealous that he recalls something from the past. I also feel for him, because it’s clear that—although the cat has been dead for a thousand years and was never really his to begin with—this is a hard thing to remember.
“Why did they make your creator kill it?”
He stares at the floor for a moment, then shrugs.
“I’m not sure,” he says. “I think they were trying to teach my progenitor something about emotions.”
What kind of lesson on emotions could be gained from making a little boy kill a kitten? Then I remember who we’re talking about—the Grownups. Compared to what we’ve seen, making a child murder his pet is nothing.
“So that was your access code? Chromium?”
“That and some other numbers and letters,” he says. “I’m not sure what they mean, or if they are just random stuff.”
The pig I killed in the garden—it was so hard to take that animal’s life. I can’t imagine what it must be like to do the same to something you love. How unfair that O’Malley remembers that act when it wasn’t even him that did it.
Maybe this is something he needs to talk about. If he wants to talk to me, I will listen, but not now. There are more important things than a dead cat.
“We need to know more,” I say. “Can the pedestals tell us about the city? The mold?”
He shakes his head. “It looks like most of the information was permanently erased. The Grownups did that, I think. I don’t know why. I was able to see some organizational information. That’s how I learned the Observatory has power.”
The Observatory. All he had to do was come out and tell us about it. Instead, he wanted us to think that going there was someone else’s idea.
Attack, attack…
“What do the symbols mean, O’Malley?”
His stone-face returns. “You don’t want to know.”
“Oh, don’t I? Now you know what I want?”
“I know what you need.”
How arrogant. My sympathy for the hurt he feels over the cat is fading fast.
“Out with it. Right now.”
He pauses.
“You’ve been telling us that we can’t afford to be divided against each other,” he says. “You’re correct. So, if I found something the Grownups did that doesn’t apply to us, and would upset people, then you’re right to say it’s best if we leave it alone.”
Arguing with each other, splitting into factions, that’s the fastest way to failure, to disaster. Do we really need things that could divide us? I want all the information I can get, but…
…wait.
Wait.
I know we can’t afford to be divided—but I never said that. Just like I didn’t say anything about looking near the shuttle to see if spiders were close.
O’Malley said those things, not me.
My anger spikes, but this time I’m ready for it. I shove it down. I set my spear against the wall, reach out and take his hand. He stares at our linked fingers, somewhat surprised. Maybe he’s only comfortable with contact if he’s the one initiating it.
“You want people to think your ideas are mine,” I say. “Why?”
His eyes go wide. He’s been caught and he knows it. Did he think I wouldn’t notice? Does he think I’m stupid, just an empty?
“My training,” he says. “I know