Requiem (34 page)

'Where would
you go?'

'Sinn.'

'And do you
think you'll be safe there?'

'At least for a
while.'

'NeoCorp isn't
just going to try to take Vale in one go,' said Sear. 'As it stands
right now, the population would be too much of a threat, even as
disorganised as it may be. NeoCorp will probably try to placate the
population first and ease into its work.'

'Whatever they
do, it will involve the death of this city,' said Cooper. 'But in
the meantime we need food. The markets here are drying up and it's
not like we can just go out hunting or foraging for it any more.
What animals and plants haven't been killed off by the heat have
already been hunted or are carrying so many diseases that you
couldn't eat them without catching them yourself. I've tried to
grow my own food in the-'

Sear held up
his hand as a gesture for Cooper to stop. He could see where this
was going.

'It goes
against protocols to involve myself too deeply with the culture I'm
supposed to be observing,' said Sear. 'Technically, I shouldn't
even be discussing this with you. For the most part the Yurrick
have given up co-operating and assisting humanity and, officially,
have decided to leave you to your own devices. If I asked them to
send supplies to a group of people I was supposed to be studying
they would deny the request. They would also probably withdraw me
from consideration for the first contact teams.'

Cooper sat back
in his chair. His hand was raised to his chin again. There was a
crease in his brow where his eyebrows narrowed. 'Couldn't you just
say that the supplies are for you?' he asked.

'If they found
out I was distributing my supplies to others, which they eventually
would, then they'd stop sending them and
definitely
withdraw
me from the programme.'

Cooper drew in
another big breath and let it out with a sigh. 'If you want access
to the books then I need food. That's the only way this is going to
work. The books are the only thing I have to trade and food is what
I need, at least for now.'

For the first
time since he'd stepped in the office, Sear found himself looking
around. It was small. The walls were covered in colourful
scribbles. There was a sun with sunglasses, there was a large,
towering skyscraper, there was a picture of a rail-road and a large
blue box with a face and lopsided wheels that looked like it might
be an old locomotive. There were also cars and animals and monsters
and people and a giant face with black scribbled all over the
bottom half of it. Sear looked at the wall to his right where the
colours were faded and guessed that was when the markers began to
run out.

Sear thought of
Cooper with the two children under his arms and the other children
laughing and running wildly through the cafeteria as he chased
them. Sear didn't know it then but this is how he'd always remember
Cooper.

'I'm here to
get a better understanding of how your culture works now and how it
worked in the past... but I-'

There was a
gentle knock on the door. Sear turned. The knock came again. Sear
stood up from his chair and opened the door. He looked down to see
the short haired girl, standing with one arm held behind her back.
She quickly pulled her hand behind her back.

'What's wrong,
Izzy?' said Cooper.

Somewhere
between those three words the strength had returned to Cooper's
voice.

Cooper knelt
down in front of Izzy. She looked as if she were about to cry or
run away or both but Cooper reached out and lay his hand gently on
her shoulder.

'What's wrong?
He asked her. He looked at her hands behind her back. 'What have
you got in your hands?' he asked.

She shook her
head at first and then reluctantly brought her hands around to her
front. She held the bowl from the cafeteria. One side of it was
cracked and broken. The pieces were held inside what remained of
the bowl.

'It was an
accident,' she said, so quietly Sear could barely hear her.

Cooper placed
his hand on the back of Izzy's head and pulled her closer and
kissed her on the forehead. He smiled down at her. 'It's no big
deal,' he said. 'It's just a bowl. Thank you for coming and telling
me, honey. At least now there won't be any more fights over who
gets the good one,' he said, half to Izzy and half to Sear. He took
the bowl from Izzy's hands and was about to send her back to the
others so he could finish his discussion with Sear before Izzy
looked up at Sear.

'Is your skin
green because you're jealous?'

Sear smiled.
'I'm beginning to think the broken bowl might not have been an
accident.'

Her brow
knitted together and she crossed her arms. 'It
was
an
accident!' She looked at Cooper who was still kneeling in front of
her. 'It
was
an accident.'

'Alright,
alright,' said Cooper. 'Sear was just kidding. Now, I want you to
go back and play with the others while we finish talking. We won't
be long.'

Izzy looked up
at Sear again and was about to ask another question when Cooper
placed both hands on her shoulders and turned her around. She
looked back over her shoulder at Sear but Cooper gently sent her on
her way. She traipsed down the corridor, stealing backward glances
at Sear.

Cooper shut the
door and walked back to his desk and placed the broken bowl on it.
'I think I've got some super-glue somewhere,' he said absently and
turned back to Sear.

'I know wha-'
Cooper stopped himself and looked at the door and through the glass
pane that took up the top third of it. Sear turned and noticed the
crest of a black head of hair rising from the bottom of the
window.

'Izzy! Back
outside. Don't make me tell you again,' ordered Cooper.

There was
little threat in Cooper's tone but the black head of hair
disappeared from the window and a few seconds later they could see
her walk back down the corridor.

Cooper was
silent for a moment, still watching the glass.

'How long has
she been here for?' Sear asked.

'Izzy? About
six years I guess. Izzy's mother brought her to me when she was
about two years old. Her father had recently passed away and her
mother was in debt to one of the local bar owners. She gave Izzy to
me, to keep her safe... killed herself not long after.'

Sear said
nothing to this.

'It's not a
unique story,' he said. 'I'm sure you've heard a million different
versions of it since you've been here.'

Sear
nodded.

'I know what
you were about to say-'

Sear held up
his hand again. 'I've already formed a first impression of your
planet and your species,' said Sear. He thought for a moment.
'Maybe you can help change that. I know someone on Saranture who
might be able to help smuggle food but I doubt that I could get
away with shipping enough food for everyone here.'

'Well, if
you're going to be spending your time here then perhaps you could
look after the children while I hunt around... or the other way
around. There's a market further into the CBD that might have
better supplies. I've never been able to venture that far, not with
the kids at least.'

Sear held out
his hand, 'I believe we have a deal. In exchange for access to your
personal library, I will help you.'

Cooper met
Sear's hand with a firm grip. 'Good.' He nodded, more to himself
than anything. 'I didn't think you'd come around, to be honest. I
don't know much about Yurrick but from what I've heard-'

'I can assure
you, Cooper, that whatever you've heard about my species is wrong,
whether you heard it from NeoCorp or the Insolvency. But since
you've included teaching as part of my role here, then I think it
would be beneficial if I gave a class or two to your students and
yourself on Yurrick culture and history.'

Cooper smiled
at this.

Seline flicked
her head back to get her fringe out of her face. Her voice was low
and reluctant, 'So... what happened to him? To Cooper.'

Sear's
concentration wavered, he'd been pulled back from wherever or
whenever his mind had taken him. He looked across at Seline and
gave a sort of shrug and said flatly, 'Disappearances were already
common in the Insolvency and they were getting worse around the
time Cooper vanished which was about three months after I first
arrived at the orphanage.'

'Did you try to
find him?'

'I did but I
couldn't just leave the orphanage.'

'What happened
to the orphanage?' Seline asked tentatively.

Sear looked
like he was going to say more but he didn't. Seline thought she
recognised something in his face; maybe it was the same thing that
she might feel whenever someone would ask about something she'd
rather forget. She understood exactly what that felt like but, for
the first time, she understood what it was like to be on the other
side of the question. Part of her just wanted him to come out and
tell her, whether it was just idle curiosity or a desire to get a
better understanding or possibly to even offer help or comfort of
some kind, she wasn't sure.

'So, who was
the person that helped you smuggle the food to Earth anyway?' she
asked.

'The Doctor,'
said Sear.

'And did you
get the information you wanted?'

'Yes. I was
eventually allowed into Cooper's library. It was in the basement
floor of the old school, beneath a wooden hatch that he kept hidden
beneath an old rug. There were thousands of books in there. When I
asked him where he got them from he simply said, “Some from here,
some from there,” and never actually answered my question. He often
spoke like that, in riddles or with answers that weren't really
answers.

'He had history
books on the Roman Empire, the Aztecs, the Egyptians. Journal
articles and scientific studies. Global climate predictions by a
group called the IPCC. A lot of our understanding of your culture
and history was learned from those very books which I scanned and
stored in Yurrick databases. Some of these texts were hundreds of
years old. They may have been limited in their knowledge or
research techniques but from what we could understand, they were
much more reliable than the word of NeoCorp.'

'And you
finished your assignment for the first contact team?'

'Yes. I
submitted it but remained on Earth.'

Seline was
about to ask why but stopped herself. She noticed Sear's eyes
drift. He was looking to change the subject. She guessed that he
was looking at the blackbox underneath her bed.

'How is the
blackbox coming?' he asked.

The words were
casual, innocent enough but they rung in Seline's head like a
church bell hit with a sledgehammer.

The blackbox.
Is that what this is all about?

It's the
reason he helped you back on Earth, it's the reason the Yurrick let
you stay on their planet and it's the reason you're on this
ship.

No, there's
more to it than that.

No. That's
what you want to think. You keep looking for signs that he might be
like you, that he's more than just a blank expression and dead
eyes.

He is more
than that. I've seen it. I've heard it.

Good luck
convincing yourself of that.

The confusion
was mounting in her head. Why did such a simple question feel like
such a dead weight driving through her skull?

Just another
customer. Only he's fucking you in a different way and doesn't even
know what he's paying for and neither do you. After all, isn't that
why he decided to help at Cooper's orphanage? So that he could get
access to information?

But something
else happened. He stayed on Earth for how many years afterward?

That's what he
wants you to think. Have you not been paying attention to how
emotionless and detached him and his companions are? He buttered
you up just so he could drop the question about the blackbox.

It's not that
simple.

Yes it is.

No.

Yes.

No...
Maybe.

She realised
that she hadn't said anything for a while. That she'd just been
staring at her knees while Sear waited for an answer.

'I haven't had
any progress,' she muttered.

Seline's
stomach made a sharp gurgling noise. The kind of noise you'd expect
from a rhinoceros drowning in a puddle.

'I think I'm
going to get something to eat,' she said.

She stood
without another word. The door slid open and she left Sear sitting
on the edge of the bed, listening to the distancing rattle of the
grates as she made her way to the lift. He didn't wonder if it had
been something he'd said for he knew that it was, he knew exactly
the mistake he'd made.

The Tryil Gate
had come and gone and space between them and the scout ship was
closing in with every second. They'd only seen one star since
passing through the Tryil Gate. A single blue supergiant that
Icarus had ignored. Everything else was naught but dust.

Seline rose.
She ate. She exercised. She watched and participated in training
drills. She helped with the maintenance run. She helped clean. She
slept. And when she couldn't sleep, she sat awake in the
observation room with the blackbox in hand. A routine was
developing. The way it had always done. Placing her left foot on
the floor first every morning, brushing her teeth from the left
side to the right, seating herself on the corner of the mess hall
table for every meal, a sip of coffee first then the cup placed on
the top left corner of the tray – the only way she knew to impose
some kind of order.

The times when
Seline couldn't sleep she would go to the observation room, connect
the blackbox and watch the opening message from her mother play
out, over and over again.