The Lost Ship of the Tucker Rebellion - Marie Sexton Page 0,18
heart was being torn in two. Yes, he knew what Laramie was getting at, but it didn’t matter. It never had. Laramie would always be his number one priority. And yet for some reason, Laramie had always resented him for it.
Denver used their clasped hands to pull Laramie closer. “You are half of me.”
Laramie jerked his hand away as if he’d been stung. “I’m not,” he said out loud, his voice forceful. But in the low light, Denver saw the glint of tears in Laramie’s eyes. “I’m me, and you’re you. I hate being your entire life. It isn’t fair to either of us.”
Denver pulled back, hurt as he always was by the distance Laramie insisted on wedging between them. Sure, he’d exploit that link when it suited him, when he thought it was inconsequential, but he wasn’t above using it to wound Denver, either.
“Would you rather I hated you?”
“No.” Laramie wiped angrily at his tears. “But I’d rather be whole on my own.”
Denver turned away, wondering if Laramie could sense how much it hurt him to hear these things.
Probably.
He didn’t understand why Laramie sometimes hated their bond, but he knew he couldn’t change it. It didn’t matter. They were brothers. As far as Denver was concerned, there was no choice.
“I say we take the money and run,” Laramie said, but without much conviction.
Denver shook his head. “No way. I’m finding that planet. We’ll both feel real sunlight. I don’t care what it takes.”
Part Two
WELL AND TRULY FUCKED
Of all humanity’s follies, the launching of “pods” ranks near the top of the list. Believing the Li’Vin would leave the Earth uninhabitable, conspiracy theorists and unhinged isolationists launched hundreds of self-sustaining capsules into space, each one packed with the treasures of Earth, meant to be gathered and used by any unlicensed colonists who managed to escape orbit.
Our eventual betrayal by the Li’Vin cannot justify such a reckless waste of Earth’s valuable resources at a time when those on Earth needed them most. One must never forget that the launching of pods was, at its heart, a cowardly act of treason.
—Official Mars textbook
Chapter Four
“Ten minutes to visual on Titan X. Get ready to answer the official questions, guys.”
Denver straightened up from where he was hunched over the open panel on the floor and rubbed his forehead. Three days from the debris field back to the station had barely been enough time to outfit the pod with a backup power source and maneuver it into the hidden compartment under the cargo bay.
Laramie had accused Denver of being paranoid, but the last thing he wanted was some bored bureaucrat deciding to do a shipboard inspection and coming across their prize. When it could, the pod would draw exactly the same amount of power that OPAL did when she was charging—just enough to keep its contents viable, and hopefully enough to make anyone who might double-check their power consumption think nothing of it. If they couldn’t make that work, then the pod could run on one of their precious nuclear batteries.
Laramie stopped in the door to the bay, his thin frame barely filling half of it. He’d just finished his treatment and looked a little better for it. Denver’d had to force him to go lie down in the first place, escalating the tension between them that had built ever since they first brought the pod on board. Denver could still sense Laramie’s confliction over what they should do with their find, but arguing about it hadn’t settled anything, and Denver wasn’t going to budge. How often did anyone get a chance like this?
“You done covering that up yet?”
“Almost.” Denver slid the last panel into place and fired the rivets back into the corners, sealing their magnetic locks shut. He leaned back and inspected the floor. “It looks too clean now.”
“Nobody’s gonna care how our floor looks.”
“They will if they suspect we’re smuggling something. It’s not the first place they’d look, but it wouldn’t take long for sweeper bots to figure it out.”
“Nobody will know we’re smuggling anything unless you let it slip.” Laramie came over and laid a hand on Denver’s shoulder, pushing a sense of calm into his head at the same time. Denver sighed and let his brother settle him. It wasn’t something Laramie did often, in part because he was rarely calm himself, but right now he definitely had an edge on Denver. “You want me to handle the intake?”
Denver hesitated. It was the smart move, he knew that. Laramie was better