gaze turns—if I didn’t know any better I’d say wistful. “I met Janela—Niall’s mother—on that first assignment. She worked in the galley until her paintings became famous.”
Famous? I learned about a bunch of painters from old Earth up to the new space-faring pioneers. I run through the names but no Janela Lawrence. Maybe Janela Radcliff? Recalling the paintings in my room, I try to envision the signature. And then it hits me. “She’s Jay El!”
“She was.”
Was. That heavy word just slices right through me. Way to go. “I’m sorry.” An inadequate, weak, stupid response.
He nods.
At least I’m smart enough not to ask how she died. Instead, I think of her paintings. My room is filled with them. “Niall didn’t tell me.”
“To him, she was just Mom.” A touch of amusement returns to Radcliff’s eyes. “Your mother is well known and highly respected in the scientific community. Do you tell your friends that?”
“No way. I complain to my friends about how annoying and overprotective she is.”
“Funny,” he says, deadpan. “I believe you think the same thing of me.”
“At least I’m not playing favorites.”
He huffs.
“Come on, you gotta admit I’m surrounded by guardian lions.”
“Guardian lions?”
Oops. “The ones in China. They guard—”
“I’ve heard of them.” Radcliff stares at the door to the pits. “It’s an apt description.”
And I can’t take any credit. “It’s Niall’s.”
No comment. I mull over all the stuff I’ve learned about Radcliff. If he joined DES in twenty-eighty, he had to be at least eighteen, which means…Radcliff is at least four hundred and sixty E-years old. Oh my stars. A million questions about Earth and the places he’s been bubble up my throat, but I swallow them all down. Bad enough I reminded him of his dead wife. Instead, I switch to a safer topic.
“With all those years of practice guarding…er…things, have you learned a trick to keep awake?” I ask.
“Coffee helps, and talking to your colleagues like we’re doing now. Except there are some situations where having a conversation is distracting and all your attention must be focused on the thing you’re keeping safe.”
I ignore the jab. “And then what do you do?”
“I imagine what would happen if I failed at my duty. Who would get hurt? What would happen?” He gestures to the entrance. “In this case, if the HoLFs escaped the pits, they would kill everyone on the base. That’s enough to keep me alert.”
And it should do the same for me. Yet after twenty minutes of quiet, I’m struggling to stay awake. I rub my arms, inflaming the healing cuts. Pain pushes the fatigue away. Eventually, though, that stops working. Maybe it’s because I know there’s no threat. No pressure or spikes of cold to indicate lurking shadow-blobs. I try pacing and bouncing on the balls of my feet. Maybe if I do a kata—
“There’s a reason I haven’t assigned you a shift to guard the lab or detention,” Radcliff says.
This ought to be good. “And that is?”
“It’s not in your skill set.”
Huh. “I’ve been training and I think I’ve shown I can handle the shadow—”
“That’s not what I meant. This is mindless work. You don’t do mindless. You never have. I need your sharp mind in the Q-net. Not sleep-deprived.”
“But I want to help the team.”
“And that’s how you can help the best. Think about it. What happens if we don’t contact DES? What happens if we don’t figure out how to counter the HoLFs?”
Fair point. Except, doing that isn’t being a part of the team. “Beau does both.”
“He does. However, he doesn’t have as many shifts on guard duty as some of the others.”
Oh. I’d hoped doing my share of guard duty would ease the tension between me and the majority of the officers.
“From what I’ve heard, you’re making an impression on the team,” Radcliff says.
Did the man just read my mind? Scary thought. “Yeah, the wrong one.” The words just slipped out of my mouth. I blame my exhaustion.
“Oh?” He focuses on me.
How to explain without sounding like a whiny four-year-old? “I think my…propensity for making suggestions and speaking my mind hasn’t been welcome.” And that Beau is scared of my new worming skills. Huh. Where did that come from? But when I examine our encounters, it makes more sense than jealousy.
“What are you going to do about it?” Radcliff asks.
Me? I tried easing their workload, but that didn’t work. I asked for a shift. I…sense this is a trick question. “Nothing.”
“Good. Keep making those suggestions. It’s my job to decide if they’re