name to know what he was—a detective. She knew the type well—serious, intense, always questioning, always curious. He eyed her like a specimen meant for study, and she shifted uncomfortably.
A quick glance over her shoulder confirmed the man who smelled like citrus was the same one who had hooded her on the deck. His entire manner mimicked Terror’s, from the way he stood to the slant of his head as he watched her and the cross of his arms across his chest. She decided they must have been trained together.
The detective rapped his knuckles on the table, and the vibrations gained her attention. She raised her eyebrows questioningly. He motioned to his mouth and asked, “Can you read my lips?”
She nodded.
“My name is Keen. I’ll be conducting the interrogation. Are you able to talk? To vocalize?”
She nodded and then shook her head.
“So you can make sounds but you can’t speak intelligible words?” he guessed.
She nodded. There was no way she was going to tell this stranger how many people had made fun of her when she was a child trying to mimic the shapes of mouths and the sounds she assumed came out of them.
“You’re familiar with a tablet?”
She nodded.
“Good.” He slid a tablet in front of her. “You type your answers to our questions. It’s a text-to-speech program. Do you understand what that means?”
Tired and aggravated, she lifted her cuffed wrists and pulled the tablet closer. She typed out her answer to his patronizing question. “I’m deaf, not stupid.”
Her interrogator’s jaw twitched. He clearly wasn’t a fan of sass. “We’ll see. Now, I’m the lead investigator for Shadow Force. Can you tell me your full legal name?”
She typed out her answer. “Mairead Faris.”
“Called Maisie?”
“Yes.”
“Your parents were Sandrine and Marcott Faris?”
“Yes.”
“You mother and father were both Harcos?”
“Yes.”
“And where were you born?”
“CIB-2.” When Keen frowned at her answer, she huffed and typed out the full name. “Chavez Ingot Belt—Planet 2.”
Keen glanced up from his tablet. “On planet or off?”
“On planet,” she clarified. “Sort of.”
Keen arched an eyebrow. “Sort of?”
She tapped at the tablet. “My father was the mine’s head engineer. He and my mother lived on Groundwork B0101.”
Keen’s eyes narrowed as if he were trying to place the name of the ship. “A terra-former?”
She nodded. “I was born on the ship and moved into the first colonized housing complex before I was a year old.”
“You were born a Defect?” He abruptly changed the subject and gestured to his own ear. “Or did you acquire an injury to lose your hearing?”
She tried not to show how it bothered her to be called a Defect. “I was born this way.”
“Your mother was also a Defect?”
“Yes.”
“And your father? He was born deaf?”
“Yes.” She held up a hand before he could ask more questions and hastily typed out her question. “We can save time if you show me what you have on your tablet and ask me if anything needs to be changed.”
Keen’s eyes narrowed slightly. “I’m running this interview.”
Badly, she thought to herself. Not wanting to rile him, she simply nodded. Her gaze moved from Keen to the towering hulk of a man leaning against the closed door. He was the rude, aggressive man from the arrivals deck. She could feel his serious stare even when she looked away from him to study the mirrored glass on the wall next to him. She believed with every fiber of her being that Terror was behind that glass.
What was Terror thinking right now? Did he feel even the slightest bit guilty about handing her over to be interrogated like this? Why did he kiss my cheek in the forest?
Keen tapped the table to get her attention. “Tell me about your father.”
“I don’t know much. He died when I was very young. Four,” she added, knowing Keen wanted her to be precise. “I only have vague memories of him.” She glanced at the giant man. “He was tall like him. Big. Strong.”
“He was an engineer?”
“Yes. He owned the mining company and designed all of the tech and machines.”
“Your family was wealthy?”
“We were.”
“Until your stepfather?”
Maisie began to understand just how much information Keen had compiled on her. It was creepy and unsettling. “Yes.”
“Tell me about him.”
“Randy?” She shrugged and typed out her real opinion of him. “He’s an asshole and a coward. He likes to play at being some big, tough soldier, but he’s so stupid he doesn’t even realize that he’s being used by them.”
“Them?”
“The Splinters,” she clarified. “He isn’t one of you. Sky warrior,” she clarified.