Earth 2.1.2

Chapter 7

A/N: Here beginneth the two chapters that kept this from being published six months ago. I wish I could say I think I finally got them right, but I can't. I finally got to the point where it felt like I was moving the deck chairs on the Titanic to get ready to sail. On the plus side, as disastrous as the Titanic was, there were some great stories that came out of it. Of course, James Cameron also got hold of it, so I guess we call it a wash. But I digress...

Thanks for the ongoing wonderful reviews. Prolix007, I do hope I haven't caused you trouble at work, but if so, tell your employer you made me very happy.

"Dr. Heller?" Yale called from outside her tent.

Julia groaned inwardly. It felt like she'd barely closed her eyes since she got back from checking in on Tru late the night before, and after the sleepless night she'd had the night before, she wanted nothing more than to roll over and ignore him.

"Just a minute," she said instead, throwing back her blanket and quickly pulling on her one change of clothes. She glanced over to where Melanie was still sound asleep and ducked through the tent flap.

"Forgive me," Yale said, looking unhappy. "I did not mean to wake you."

"It's okay," Julia said quietly, though she knew she was less than convincing. "What's wrong?"

"I had another…incident," he said. "Well…two of them. While you were looking for the children."

"A blackout?" she said. "Or a memory?"

"Blackout," he said, "though there was a moment after I became aware of my surroundings the second time when I felt like I was somewhere else."

"How long were they?" Julia asked.

"The first was ten minutes," he said. "The second was nearly thirty." He looked shaken. "I was almost outside the camp, Doctor. Alonzo Solace nearly shot me."

Julia raised her eyebrows. "That's not good," she said, and Yale actually looked annoyed at the understatement. "I'm sorry," she added contritely. "Obviously it's not good. You haven't had two that close together before."

"Indeed," he said. "That is why I could wait no longer to speak to you. Now that Ulysses has returned, I do not feel safe staying in the same tent with him. I do not know what I am capable of doing during one of these blackouts."

Julia frowned. "Yale, I don't think you're dangerous—"

"I do!" he said harshly, and immediately looked apologetic when Julia recoiled. "Forgive me," he said. "But…I am frightened, Doctor. I stood guard duty with Toshiko last night because I wanted someone I trust to watch over me."

"Yale, you have to sleep," Julia said, looking at his exhausted face in concern. "Whatever is happening to you—"

"I went to sleep, Julia, and I woke up with a mag-pro pointed at my face!" Yale said, his voice rising.

Julia blanched, shocked as much by his use of her first name as anything. She sighed helplessly. "I—I'll talk to Valerie," she said, grasping at straws. "Maybe she's found something in your coding."

"And if she has not?"

"I don't know," Julia said. She glanced nervously over at Devon's tent. "Have you told Devon what's going on?"

Yale shook his head emphatically.

"Yale," Julia said patiently, "she already knows you're having the blackouts. You have to tell her. Didn't she ask why you weren't in the tent last night?"

"I left after she'd fallen asleep," Yale said, looking away in shame.

Julia shifted so she could look him in the eye. "You will tell her. Right now. I'll go talk to Valerie," she said. When Yale didn't respond, she put her hand on his shoulder. "Yale, you have to trust me. We'll figure something out. But in the meantime, Devon has to know. You owe her that."

"But…what if…?" Yale began, his voice shaking. He took a deep breath. "What if she is afraid of me?"

Julia smiled at him. "This is Devon we're talking about. When has she been afraid of anything?" Except guns, she thought wryly.

She watched as he headed back towards Devon's tent, and sighed. There was no way she was going to talk to Valerie this early. Not and keep her head, at any rate. She turned and headed back into her tent.

The best thing I can do now is figure out what Aeneas was all about, she thought, trying to remember exactly what her line of thinking had been before she'd slammed on the brakes the night before. She replayed the scene in her mind, but after rethinking it, she was no closer to an answer.

All I have are two events that seem connected, but can't be, she thought, frustrated. There's no way Yale could have been involved in the original event at Aeneas—

She froze, staring blindly at her lab table. Of course there's a way, she thought. The same way we got here.

Danziger woke up with a headache. He hadn't slept well, and not just because he'd had to keep scanning Tru. He sat up with a groan.

"Hey, Dad," Tru croaked.

He turned to look at her. "Hey, Tru-girl," he said. "How ya doin'?"

She grimaced. "I feel like the Transrover's sitting on my chest," she said. "But my head doesn't hurt so bad anymore."

"That's good," he said. "Julia said your lungs would take some time to clear, so don't stress out about the chest thing. We'll ride in the Transrover for a couple of days so you can rest, and she says you'll bounce back in no time."

"How's Uly?" she said.

"He's fine," Danziger said immediately. "All he's been doing is worrying about you. You impressed the heck out of him out there, kid."

Tru looked embarrassed. "I didn't do anything," she said. "He's the one who got us out of the river. And then—" She remembered in a hazy, nightmarish way how he'd talked her through the terrifying moments when she couldn't breathe.

"Where'd you just go, Tru?" Danziger said gently, kneeling next to her cot.

"I was scared," she said, looking seriously at him. "I couldn't breathe, and the more I couldn't breathe, the more scared I got." She blinked hard.

"He said something about that. He talked you down, didn't he?"

"Yeah," she said shakily. "If he hadn't been there…" She trailed off, looking unhappy.

"I'm glad he was," Danziger said fervently.

"Me, too," Tru said, and then, after a beat, "but I swear to God, Dad, if you tell him I said that, I will hurt you."

"I'm a vault," Danziger said, holding up his hands defensively. He hesitated, then plunged ahead. "Look, when we got there, you said something, and I wanted to ask you about it."

Tru frowned, clearly not remembering much from that time.

"You said, 'Thanks for the pink,'" Danziger said. "I think I know what you meant, but…"

"Oh, jeez, I said that out loud?" Tru groaned.

"You liked it!" Danziger said, grinning. "You really liked the pink room! I knew it!"

"No!" Tru said, horrified. "It was awful!"

Danziger's face fell.

"Oh, for—" Tru huffed. "I hated the pink, Dad—hated it—but…" She paused, clearly reluctant to continue. "But…it was a really nice thing you did. That's all I meant."

Danziger looked confused, but nodded.

Tru groaned. "Okay, I'm going to explain this, but I don't ever want to hear you talk about it again." She glared at him until he nodded. "When you were gone, that pink room was about the only thing I had from you. So even though the pink was awful, I never had Mom redo it. And the whole time I was with Station Services, it made me so mad that somebody else got to have my pink room."

Danziger blinked back tears.

"And then Uly told me, when I was wigging out, that I should think of someplace that made me happy." She looked up at her father. "That was my place, okay? So that's why I said thanks." She paused, then gave him a fierce look. "But if you ever give me anything pink again, I'll smother you with a pink pillow or something. Got it?"

"Yes, ma'am," Danziger said contritely.

Devon met with Rob and Sergei early that morning. They'd gotten back late the night before, with word of a possible winter camp site. Devon listened to them describing the spot, trying to get a handle on how they should proceed that day, but she was having a hard time keeping her mind on what they were saying. Yale had told her about his most recent blackouts, and his fear had been palpable. She'd done her best to reassure him, but she'd had little success.

And no wonder, she thought grimly. I'm scared for him. And for all of us.

"The thing is," Rob was saying as Devon wrenched her mind away from her worries about Yale and back to the conversation, "there's a lot of interference with the comm up there. That's the only downside to the spot. I talked to Melanie about it, and she seemed to think it might be some sort of magnetic interference. Probably from geologic sources."

Devon frowned. "How bad was it?"

Rob shrugged. "There were a few spots close to the site we picked out where we couldn't get through to Mel at all."

Sergei nodded. "But remember how Julia thought that the Terriers' empathic communication might be tied to bioelectric fields?"

Devon immediately saw where he was headed. "You think these hills might interfere with the Terriers' communication, too?"

Sergei shrugged. "Rob and I had plenty of time on the way back to think it through. I think it's a good possibility, and so does Melanie."

Devon considered the possibility for a long moment. "If that is the case…" she began.

"Yeah," Rob said, grinning. "This might be the safest spot on the planet for us to hole up."

Devon sighed in relief. "Perfect," she said. "So it's how far away?"

"A little over thirty k," Sergei said. "It'll take a little longer for the Transrover to get there than it did us, though. The terrain gets pretty rough up there unless we really detour north to get around the spur of the foothills. Either way, I think we're at least two days from it, probably more like three if we're as careful as I think we need to be."

"Okay," Devon said, "get everybody ready to pack up. I want us to get to that spot you picked out three days from now at the latest so we can start setting up the domes and send out a scout team. I don't want to risk anybody getting stuck in snow or something because we took too long going after the supply pod." She frowned. "How many people have you—?"

"Nobody knows but you, Mel and Tosh," Sergei said. "I didn't want to get anybody's hopes up, either. Rob here might be a little dim, but I'm not."

"Hey!" Rob said. "Who picked up the signal?"

Sergei raised his hands in surrender. "Okay, okay, you're only a little dim."

Rob rolled his eyes as Sergei sauntered off towards the mess tent, then turned to look back at Devon. "Um, Devon, I know you've probably heard this a lot, but we're both really glad Uly and Tru are safe. It was the best news ever when Melanie told us you'd found them. They're good kids."

Yes, they are, Devon thought, wishing she'd told Tru that herself before all this happened. Now it would probably seem to Tru like guilt talking. Which, if she was perfectly honest with herself, it would be, at least a little. Even so, she told herself, you'd better do it, or Uly will never forgive you.

Julia was grateful to finally get back on the road again. There was something about the monotony of walking along that helped her to think. At least as long as she could keep Melanie occupied with something other than talking to her.

Luckily, she and Valerie were busy working on tapping into the Council satellite feed and figuring out how to hack the encryption.

Valerie had been as frustrated as Julia over Yale's situation when Julia had finally gotten to talk to her about it. "There are millions of lines of code in his programming," Valerie had said. "I have a bot scanning the code and flagging some key words, but it's going to take time."

"How much time?" Julia had asked.

Valerie had shrugged. "At least another day, maybe more. And even then, I'll have to go through each of the flagged segments and figure them out."

Julia sighed as she walked along. At least they weren't in the awkward position of having to decide which took precedence, predicting the weather, or helping Yale. And Valerie had some interesting thoughts about the conflict between Yale's organic memory and his mechanical memory being the cause of the blackouts. Julia had spent most of the morning thinking through the implications.

If Valerie was right, the key to Yale's problem was figuring out his past. So Julia decided to go through each of his flashbacks as he'd described them and see if there was anything in them that could give her a clearer picture of what had happened. And when.

The really crucial bit of evidence was one she'd felt foolish not to have considered before. There was no way the incident on Aeneas that Yale had witnessed could have been any later than eighty years ago, because the Heller Corporation had decommissioned that installation and shifted to more productive mines on other asteroids in 2134.

So the options are either he was there eighty years ago, and somehow ended up in coldsleep for over seventy years, or that he simply witnessed a recording of those events. She knew the latter was more likely, more plausible, but his reactions to the flashbacks had been far too visceral for her to believe he'd been anything but an eyewitness.

And as implausible as the coldsleep theory was, it wasn't impossible.

So where does that leave us? she thought. Morgan had said that the first generation Yales had all been criminals before they became cyborgs. Which meant that Yale had to have been a criminal. But that didn't mean much—there were any number of things that could get a person labeled a "criminal" by the Council. He could have been a political protestor or a neo-environmentalist.

Or, she thought suddenly, a deserter. Certainly the events as he'd described them would fit that story. He'd been holding a weapon, then witnessed an explosion, and argued with an officer.

But none of that tells me who he was, she thought, frustrated. And there isn't a shred of evidence to connect him to that conversation I overheard, either. I need more to go on than—

Alonzo whizzed by in the ATV, kicking up a cloud of dust that billowed back into her face, and Julia ducked her head to avoid it.

He hadn't said a single word to her since the argument, and she couldn't figure out if she was happy about that or not. On the one hand, it was a relief. Even as distracted as she had been over the past few days by the rescue of the children and by the ongoing Yale crisis, she kept replaying his words to her in her mind—

She wrenched her mind violently away from that line of thinking. It wasn't going to do her any more good than it ever did, and she needed to focus on Yale.

But even as she tried to avoid it, the most important part of that night ran through her mind. He had told her he loved her. And she hadn't said anything in response.

The day passed in a blur for Devon. They made good time traveling, and were within a little more than a day's travel of the site that Rob and Sergei had found by the time she called a halt. But during that whole time, Devon barely had a moment to herself, between planning the setup of the domes with Rick, putting together teams to scout south through the foothills to look for the supply pod, and getting updates from Melanie and Valerie about their satellite hack.

"It's working great," Melanie had said as they walked along late in the afternoon, proudly showing off the images on her tablet. "Valerie was brilliant—I really didn't think she'd be able to break the encryption that fast."

Valerie looked smugly at her. "Now you know better."

"They're looking right at us," Devon said uneasily, studying the image.

Melanie nodded. "Luckily, the resolution isn't all that high. Remember, the atmosphere here is denser than Old Earth's was, so the image is a little blurry. I think they went bargain basement with this satellite—it looks like the optics are a century out of date. That won't hurt us as far as tracking weather, but it does make it harder for the Council to find us."

"But they'll be able to spot the domes pretty easily," Devon said.

Melanie looked nervous. "I hadn't thought about that. But at least it looks like we're going to have some heavy cloud cover over the next several days. That should give us time to get set up without them seeing it."

Devon tapped her gear. "Rick, I need to talk to you again. We need to figure out how to camouflage the domes."

That conversation took a good part of the evening, with Rick recruiting Rob and Bill and anyone else within earshot to brainstorm ideas for how to hide the domes. By the time Devon finally got to bed, they'd come up with a workable plan, though Devon had really stopped paying attention by the time they'd decided on it.

But that wasn't the end of Devon's day. She spent another hour at least talking Yale through his continuing fears about his stability.

"We're not leaving you behind," Devon said insistently. "So don't even think about saying it again."

Yale looked frustrated. "Then would you consider allowing Dr. Heller to sedate me?" he said.

Devon raised her eyebrows. "You can't be serious," she said. "We can't cart your unconscious body all over G-889!"

Yale shook his head. "Once we are in the winter camp, we could do it," he said. "It might allow us to delay the worsening of my symptoms long enough for Valerie to find some way to alleviate whatever is causing the trouble."

"Yale, we don't even know that your symptoms are worsening," she said, but his look told her he knew better. She sighed. "Fine. We can talk to Julia about it, but her decision is final. If she says it's a bad idea, you won't bring it up again, okay?"

Yale insisted on asking her immediately, but luckily Julia was still awake. And as soon as they talked to her, Devon was glad she'd given in to Yale. Julia was aghast at the very idea.

"That's insane!" she said, staring at Yale like he'd just suggested she cut off his head. "No, absolutely not!"

"But Dr. Heller," Yale protested.

"No," Julia said adamantly. "That is absolutely the last resort. Only if you actively become violent, and I'm not sure I'd risk it even then." She looked intently at him. "Yale, with your databases, you know as well as anyone the dangers of that kind of extended sedation. Just the effects of the sedative on the liver and kidneys would make me nervous, let alone what it would do to the brain of a normal human. But you add in the complication of your cybernetic systems, and the stresses you're already under…" She trailed off, hoping she'd gotten through to him.

He glanced over at Devon appealingly.

She shook her head. "I told you, Yale, Julia's word is final," she said.

He nodded reluctantly.

"Why don't you head on back to the tent and make sure Uly is really asleep," Devon said. "He keeps trying to fake it and read his tablet under the covers," she told Julia, who smiled.

Yale looked nervous. "I am uncomfortable being alone with Ulysses, Devon. What if I should have another flashback or blackout?"

Devon winced. "I'm sure you'll be—" she began, but stopped. What if he's right? What if he really could be dangerous? "Go find Toshiko or somebody else who's still up and have her stay with you and Uly till I get back," she said, hating herself for even considering the possibility his concern was valid.

Yale still looked reluctant, but finally acquiesced.

After he'd left, Devon turned to Julia, who shook her head helplessly. "I don't know what to tell you, Devon," she said.

"Isn't there anything we can do?"

Julia shrugged. "I'm trying to figure out if there's anything in his flashbacks that can give us a clue to who he was. I was talking to Valerie, and we're hoping that the cause of his problem is that his organic memory is in conflict with his mechanical memory. But if we can get his real past into his mechanical memory, maybe that conflict could be eliminated."

Devon looked skeptical, and Julia nodded. "I know, it's a long shot, and it depends entirely on us figuring out who he was." She sighed. "I'm sorry, Devon. I wish I could do more for him. And for you."

"Don't apologize," Devon said quickly. "I appreciate all you and Valerie are doing for him."

But Devon could tell Julia was thinking the same thing she was. I just wish you could do more.

"Devon," Toshiko said, coming up to her as she approached the mess tent the next morning. "We have a problem."

"What now?" Devon groaned, bracing herself for another insane day.

"It's Hardy," Toshiko said, and her nose wrinkled like she'd smelled something bad.

"What? I thought his leg was almost healed. He's been walking around without the crutches."

Toshiko nodded. "That's the problem," she said. "He wants back in the rotation for scouting. And since you decided nobody leaves camp alone..."

Devon's rolled her eyes. "Nobody wants to go with him," she said under her breath.

Toshiko nodded again. "Not even Morgan," she said. "I think Bess is mad enough at Hardy, Morgan doesn't want to risk her getting mad at him, too."

"Danziger will do it," Devon said, though she knew she'd have to get Tosh to ask him for her. Yet another thing I haven't had time to deal with, she thought tiredly.

"He would, but he's not on scout yet. He wants to stick close to Tru. I guess she's still coughing—don't worry," she added, raising her hand to stop Devon from running straight to Danziger's tent. "Julia said she'd be fine, but Danziger doesn't want to go on scout while she's still recovering."

"Hell," Devon said, thinking. "Maybe I can get Julia to say he isn't ready yet. Then we can send him out with Danziger once Tru's healthy again." She headed over to the med tent.

"I'll go with him," Julia said after Devon had explained everything.

"Like hell you will!" Melanie said hotly.

"She's right," Devon said. "I'm not risking our doctor just so Hardy can feel better about himself." Besides, she thought, it'd be even worse if Hardy refused to go with Julia.

Julia looked rebellious for a moment, then shrugged. "I guess I can figure out some reason to keep him here. I'll go tell him," she said, starting for the tent flap.

"No way," Melanie said, grabbing her arm. "First off, you don't need to put yourself through that. But secondly," she said holding up her hands to keep Julia from interrupting, "you know he won't accept it coming from you."

"She's right," Devon said reluctantly. "Melanie and I will tell him. He won't be happy, but at least he won't be yelling at you and making things worse."

She was wrong.

"This is Julia's way of punishing me, isn't it?" Hardy said angrily when Devon had finished explaining to him.

Melanie looked surprised.

"Well, I'm not about to sit here twiddling my thumbs till she decides to let me off the hook," he said, and started for the rail, nearly colliding with Valerie as he went.

"Hardy," Devon said, following him, "stop. You can't go without a partner, and I'm not going to—"

"I don't need a god-damned partner!" Hardy said, climbing into the driver's seat and starting the rail.

"Hardy, get out of that rail!" Devon said, but he'd already thrown it into gear and peeled out, showering them with gravel as the wheels spun.

"Damn it!" Devon said furiously, brushing dirt from her face. "Damn it, damn it, damn it!"

"Should we send somebody after him?" Melanie said, watching him heading south.

"No!" Devon snapped. "If he gets himself killed out there, that's his problem!"

"Is it?" Valerie said. "Devon, what if he's the spy?"

Devon turned to look at her, surprised. "Are you kidding? There's no way he's the spy—he's about as subtle as a supernova!"

"Maybe that's why he acts that way. Devon, this could be his opportunity to report in," Valerie said. "What if he found a way to contact them? It would certainly explain why he's so eager to get out of camp."

Devon looked at her for a long moment, then nodded reluctantly. "Follow him," she said.

Valerie took off running for the second rail, calling for Rick to join her as she went.

Melanie looked after her, a thoughtful expression on her face. "Did you notice what he said?"

"What?" Devon said.

"He called her Julia. Not 'that Council spy' or 'her' or 'Council whor—"

"I get the picture," Devon cut in. "Why is that important?"

"He also said this was her way of punishing him," Melanie continued. "Not that this was some devious plan of hers to screw things up for all of us. Why would he think she was punishing him?"

Devon raised her eyebrows. "You think he's coming around?"

Melanie shrugged. "I don't know. If he is the spy, this might be the chance we need to catch him. But if he isn't, maybe letting him have some time on his own to think is a good thing."

"Well," Melanie said, coming into the med tent. "That was unexpected."

"What?" Julia said.

"Hardy took off," Melanie said. "And Valerie and Rick are following him."

Julia looked at her sharply. "You don't think—"

"That he's the spy? Of course I do, Julia," Melanie said. "So does Valerie. What are we supposed to think? He's been nothing but belligerent to you ever since the cliff—hell even before that—and he's completely alienated himself from everyone, so he has a lot of time to himself. Hell, the other night, Helen said she caught him walking around outside the camp, just inside the perimeter. And now he's taken off by himself in the rail. None of that looks good, Julia."

Julia looked like she'd been kicked in the stomach. "That isn't proof," she said quietly. "It's all circumstantial."

"Of course it's circumstantial! It's not like he's going to—" Melanie stopped cold, looking hard at Julia. "Wait a minute," she said, suddenly realizing why Julia looked that way. "You can't be serious."

"Serious? What do you mean?" Julia said, but she wouldn't meet Melanie's eyes.

Melanie stared at her, and then burst out laughing.

Julia frowned. "What's so funny?"

Melanie took a breath. "You really think Alonzo could be the spy? Alonzo?!"

Julia looked trapped. "What does any of this have to do with Alonzo? I never said—"

"You didn't have to!" Melanie said. "It's all right there on your face! And all that stuff I said about Hardy could be said about Alonzo." She closed her eyes for a moment, shaking her head. "Oh, my god, so that's what all this has been about, isn't it? He's angry with you for suspecting him."

Julia turned and started packing away the equipment she had out on her lab table.

"Well, he has every right to be! Julia, you should know better! Come on, think it through. Why on earth would the Council recruit a member of the crew as a spy? If they wanted to keep an eye on the Eden Project, they'd need somebody in the Eden Project, wouldn't they?"

"And the same could be said for Hardy," Julia said defensively, though she was revisiting her own doubts in the face of Melanie's utter certainty she was wrong. "Besides, maybe they already had somebody on the crew, so they decided to use—"

"Right," Melanie said derisively. "They just happened to have recruited a member of our crew, somebody who'd be available and useful to them for a month or two every six years, at best?" She sighed. "Julia, it just doesn't make any sense. I've known Alonzo Solace for…" She stopped, calculating in her head. "…Somewhere close to sixty years. And we've only been out of coldsleep for maybe seven years of that time."

"Melanie, I know that," Julia said, turning to face her. "Why do you think I haven't said anything?"

"Besides," Melanie went on, ignoring her, "the whole reason Alonzo is a sleepjumper is because he hates the Council. He used to be in the CSF, you know. When I first met him, he'd just gotten out, and he had nothing good to say about the experience."

"I know that, too," Julia said. "He told me about that, before all this started."

"Not all of it," Melanie said darkly. "He wouldn't have told you how he really felt about the Council. Julia, he hates them even more than Hardy does. Hell, even more than you!"

"Then why did he act the way he did?" Julia said helplessly.

"I don't know!" Melanie said. "You tell me. How did he act? This all started with that conversation you had after the attack, right?"

Julia bit her lip, but didn't answer.

"What did you both say?" Melanie said. "And I mean word for word."

"I said, 'I know. I shouldn't be so nervous. But we got lucky this time. If that explosion that hit the ATV had been just a few meters one way or the other, we could have lost Inez or Yale, and maybe more.'" Julia hesitated, then plunged forward. "Then I said, 'And we still have the spy to worry about.' And that's when he started acting weird."

Melanie frowned. "Weird how? What did he say—exactly?"

Julia frowned, shaking her head. "I was thinking about Yale right after I said that about the spy, about what Yale had said—the Dante quote. And I remembered that Alonzo said his mother taught literature, so I asked him about the Inferno, and he thought at first I was talking about the fire you started, but then I said the quote, and—" She stopped, remembering the look on his face.

"What?" Melanie said. "What happened next?"

When he asked if I meant the fire, his expression was confused, not angry, she thought. But she'd already talked about the spy at that point. Oh, god, what if I've been wrong?

"Julia?" Melanie prompted.

"It must have been the quote," Julia said, her forehead creased in confusion. "Could that be what made him mad, not what I said before it?" She shook her head. "But what on earth is there about that quote that could make him so angry?"

"Go ask him!" Melanie said, as if it was obvious. "Right now!"

Julia looked nervous. "I can't, Melanie. You didn't hear him before. He was furious—"

"Of course he was furious!" Melanie said. "But if you tell him you don't think he's the spy, he won't have to be furious anymore."

Julia shook her head. "You can't honestly think he'll just get over it like that," she said.

"Fine," Melanie said, standing up. "If you won't ask him, I will."

"No!" Julia said, grabbing her arm. "You can't!"

"Of course I can," Melanie said. "It's easy. I'll just go over there and say, 'Hey, Alonzo—"

"Melanie," Julia pleaded.

"Then you'll ask him," Melanie said, and it wasn't a question.

Julia hesitated, looking like she'd rather face a pack of hexadents.

"You'll go over there, you'll apologize for being such an enormous idiot to think he was the spy, and then you'll ask him what's really going on," Melanie said patiently.

"Everybody's packing up," Julia said, grasping at straws. "What if he's already left?"

Melanie gave her a look. "Then you'll call him on gear and get him back," she said, her voice almost menacing.

Julia visibly deflated. "Okay," she said finally. She started for the tent flap, then turned to look at Melanie. "Come with me," she said.

Melanie shook her head. "Somebody needs to pack up our tent. Besides, I'd only make things worse," she said. "You need to fix this, Julia."

She's right, Julia thought, leaving the tent. But how?

"Oh, crap," Valerie breathed.

"What is it?" Rick said, slowing the rail and glancing over at her. Her head was bent over her tablet, and she was tapping frantically.

"I lost him," she said. "He must have turned off his gear."

Rick frowned. "Couldn't it just be that he got into an area where there's too much interference?"

Valerie looked skeptical. "The signal's gone, Rick. Not intermittent, not garbled. It's just gone."

"How far away was he when we lost him?"

"Three klicks," Valerie said. "If he's in a bad signal area, it must be a cave. Or a shielded bunker."

Rick groaned inwardly. He didn't much care for Hardy, but he hadn't thought he was capable of betraying them all to the Council. I guess I was wrong, Rick thought grimly. He tapped at his gear. "Melanie?" he said.

Static.

Rick frowned. They'd been able to get at least intermittent contact for the last five klicks, though it had gotten worse the last time they'd checked in. "Mel, if you can hear any of this, we lost Hardy's signal."

More static, without even a hint of variation in the hiss to indicate there was anyone there.

"Stupid rocks," Valerie said, looking up at the steep hillside beside them. "What do we do now?"

"We keep going," Rick said. "If he is in a bad signal area, we should pick him up again. If he did turn off his gear, we still might be able to get close enough to find him."

"And then?" Valerie said, glancing over at Rick.

"Then we bring him back," Rick said resolutely.

Valerie looked uncomfortable. "Rick—"

"No," Rick said. "I know what you're thinking, but I didn't sign on to kill people in cold blood. And I'm still not convinced he is the spy. We can't get through to the camp from here, and for all we know, they've lost our signal." He shook his head. "No. We get him, we bring him back. Besides, if he is the spy, we might be able to get him to tell us more about the Council."

Valerie looked skeptical, but she nodded. "Okay," she said. She sighed. "Thanks. I'm not sure I could have done it anyway."

Julia stood by the mess tent, looking across at Alonzo as he packed his gear by the Transrover. Come on, she thought. Just go over there and talk to him.

And say what? the rebellious part of her thought. What can you possibly say to him? But she finally forced herself to start towards the Transrover. "Alonzo?"

He looked up sharply at her call, then turned and savagely shoved something into his bag.

Julia hesitated, trying to figure out what to say.

"What do you want, Heller?" he said, throwing his bag onto the back of the Transrover and turning to look at her. "I gotta go scout with Artie."

"It was the quote," she heard herself say. "The Dante quote. That's what made you angry."

He stared at her. "Yeah," he said finally, his voice dripping with derision. "Way to go, Doc. Mission accomplished."

"But…why?" Julia said. "I don't—"

"You know damned well why!" he snapped.

"No!" Julia protested. "I swear, Alonzo, I don't know."

"Then why the hell did you bring it up?" he said. "It's not like that line's a great conversation starter!"

"Because Yale said it, and I thought you might know why!" Julia said. She pushed a strand of hair away from her eyes, tucking it behind her ear. "Alonzo, please, I'm not good at this—I don't—"

Alonzo laughed. "Not good at this?" he said, climbing into the ATV. "I'd say you were doing just fine. You wanted to know if I'd react to that quote, and I did. But that doesn't mean I'm the spy, damn it!" He threw the ATV in gear.

"Alonzo, wait! Stop! I don't think—!" Julia shouted, but he'd already pulled away. "I don't think you're the spy," she repeated helplessly.

"Hey, Danziger," Devon called as he came out of his tent.

He turned and looked at her as she came closer. "Adair," he said warily.

"Listen, I was wondering if you'd let me drive the 'Rover this morning," she said nervously.

He shook his head. "Tru needs to ride still. Julia said she needs the cabin filters so her lungs don't have to work as hard."

Devon nodded. "I know. I wanted to have a chance to talk to her."

Danziger raised his eyebrows.

"I understand if you don't want me to do it today," Devon said, looking everywhere but at him. "I mean, if she's too tired, I can wait, or…if you'd rather I didn't, I respect that…"

"What did you want to talk to her about?" he said.

Devon took a breath. "I…I'd rather not say," she said. "But I'm not going to yell at her or anything." She hesitated. "Please."

"Go ahead," Danziger said gruffly. "I can walk for a while."

Devon breathed a sigh of relief. "Thank you," she said, and started for the Transrover.

Danziger watched her go, frowning.

"Wait!" Valerie said, shielding her tablet screen from the late morning sun. "I've got something!" She tapped on the tablet. "It's the supply pod signal," she said after a long moment. "About five k southwest of us."

"Still nothing from Hardy?" Rick said.

Valerie shook her head. "I wish I knew where the hell he went. I don't like the idea of him running around out here doing—" She cut off abruptly. "Well, ask and ye shall receive."

"You got him back?"

Valerie nodded. "He's really close to the supply pod. He isn't moving. It looks like—wait, no, he's moving again. He's headed back towards us." She looked up. "Can you run us up to the edge of that hill?" she said pointing. "We might be able to see him from there."

Rick nodded and turned the rail up the hill. He had to maneuver around several stands of trees and shrubs that were too tight to get through, but after a few minutes, they were stopped by a rock outcropping overlooking the broad plains to the south.

Valerie hopped out, pulling out her monocular and clambering up to the top of the rocks.

"See anything?" Rick said, climbing up next to her and shielding his eyes against the mid-afternoon sun.

"Not yet," Valerie said. She lowered the monocular and glanced at her tablet. "He should be there." She raised the monocular again. "There! I've got him." She handed Rick the monocular. "See where that little stream runs down out of the foothills?" she said, pointing. "Just to the west of that."

"Aw, hell," Rick said, staring out through the monocular.

"What is it?" Valerie said, squinting as she tried to see what he was reacting to.

"Well, the good news is we found the supply pod," Rick said, handing the monocular back to her.

She raised them and almost immediately saw what the bad news was. "How many of them do you think there are?" she breathed. She could see Hardy's rail speeding up towards the foothills, and behind him, a cloud of dust being raised by too many Terriers to count. Behind them, off in the distance, was the supply pod.

"Come on," Rick said, grabbing her arm to pull her back towards the rail. "I'm not sticking around to get a count of them. They're headed our way. We need to get out of here."

"Wait!" Valerie said, resisting his pull. She adjusted the monocular, trying to bring the supply pod into focus. "Take a look at the supply pod. Do you see what I see?"

Rick took the monocular back looked through them and groaned. "Damn."

"I'll take that as a yes." Valerie sighed. "Oh, and I was so looking forward to coffee."

Rick turned and started back for the rail at a run. "Come on. We need to get to high ground fast."

"What about Hardy?" Valerie said, following him.

"He's on his own," Rick said, jumping into the rail and throwing it into reverse the moment Valerie was in. "If he's running from them, maybe he's still on our side. But there's no way I'm going to risk the two of us trying to stop that crowd down there. They find us, we're dead. And we have to let the others know what we found."

Tru was already asleep in the cabin of the Transrover when Devon got in. She closed the cabin door carefully, trying not to wake her, but starting the engine jolted her awake.

"Where's my dad?" Tru said, looking over at Devon warily.

"He's walking right now," Devon said, starting the Transrover up the long hill ahead of them.

"Why?" Tru asked.

"Um...I'll explain that in a minute," Devon said, making a show of driving the Transrover. "Let me get used to driving this thing."

Tru looked at her skeptically, but didn't say anything. She settled back and was asleep within moments, her breathing still sounding labored.

Devon glanced over at her as she drove, relieved to have the respite, though she knew she'd have to bite the bullet eventually. She ran through what she wanted to say again in her mind, and once again, it sounded all wrong.

An hour later, she was too slow in maneuvering to avoid a rock, and the Transrover lurched. Tru started awake.

"Sorry," Devon said, glancing over at her apologetically. "Go back to sleep," she added hopefully.

"It's okay," Tru said thickly, rubbing at her eyes. "I feel like I've slept for a month already."

"It's good for you," Devon said. "Julia said the best thing for you now was to rest."

"Yeah," Tru said, and turned to look uneasily at Devon. "Listen, if this is about what happened, I'm really sorry. I should have—"

"Oh, no!" Devon said quickly, shaking her head emphatically. "No, don't be sorry. It wasn't your fault."

"Oh," Tru said, surprised. She looked back out through the Transrover's windshield, waiting for Devon to continue. Finally she couldn't stand waiting any longer. "Then...why—?" she began.

"Damn," Devon said under her breath, then glanced over at Tru apologetically. "I'm really bad at this."

"At what?" Tru said, baffled.

"Apologizing," Devon said, and she almost laughed at Tru's wide-eyed look. "Yes, I'm apologizing to you. For treating you the way I have," she went on. "And for blaming you for what happened. I know," she added, forestalling Tru's question, "I said it wasn't your fault, and I meant it. But at first, I wanted to blame you because that was so much easier than admitting that it was Uly who screwed up. I've been pretending that he's still that same sweet kid that he was when he was sick, but he isn't. If he ever really was."

"He's not so bad," Tru protested.

Devon smiled at her. "I know he's not. He's just figuring out that he can do all the things he never could before, and he wants to do it all right now. I can hardly blame him for that. But more than that, it's ridiculous of me to blame you for it."

"Don't worry about it," Tru said, clearly uncomfortable. "I've done plenty of stuff you can blame me for."

Devon laughed. "You are a remarkable girl, Tru," Devon said, relieved to finally have broken through the dam holding back what she wanted to say. "You deserve to hear that from me. Your mother raised you well, and your father—" She broke off, trying to swallow the lump of guilt in her throat. "Your father," she continued, "is doing a far better job at parenting you than I am parenting Uly."

Tru shook her head. "Uly is way nicer than I am," she said, "and more respectful. I'm a pain in the—" She broke off, blushing. "But that's my fault, not my dad's."

"And anything good in Uly comes far more from him and from Yale's influence than it does from me," Devon said, half to herself, and then shook her head. "Don't mind me, I'm just wallowing in self-pity again." She sighed. "Anyway, I just wanted you to know how much I appreciate what you've done for Uly, not just out there, but all along. He's better for knowing you." She smiled at Tru wryly. "And I wanted you to know that before I apologize to your dad for how badly I treated him while you were gone."

"Oh," Tru said, trying to follow Devon's line of thinking, and failing. She blinked tiredly. "Okay."

"Go back to sleep," Devon said. "I've given you way too much to think about, and Julia will have my head if you start coughing again."

Tru tried to think of something to say, but even though she'd been sleeping almost non-stop since they got back, she was still so tired she couldn't keep her eyes open for more than a few minutes at a time. The last thing she was aware of as she fell asleep was Devon's hand touching her head gently as the Transrover rumbled along. And how nice that felt.

"Alonzo," Melanie called on gear.

"What?" Alonzo snapped.

"Jeez, Alonzo," Artie said from the back of the ATV.

"How far out are you?" Melanie said.

"About five k," Alonzo said. "Why?"

"I need you to come back in," Melanie said.

"Why?"

"Because you didn't give Julia a chance to finish her conversation. And you both could fix everything if you'd just get your heads out of your asses and talk to each other!"

Alonzo didn't say anything.

"Unless, of course, you really are the spy, in which case I take it all back about Julia," Melanie continued.

"You know damned well—"

"Yes, I do," Melanie said with a dangerous edge to her voice. "But nobody else does. And I'm perfectly willing to make the accusation if you refuse to listen."

"You wouldn't," Alonzo said uneasily.

"If you were the Alonzo I know and love, I wouldn't. But right now?" Melanie left the question hanging in the air.

Alonzo swore. "Fine," he said. "I'll be back in an hour."

"Good," Melanie said. "She'll be waiting. And you'd better be nice."

"Don't push it, Mel," Alonzo said, turning the ATV.

Valerie gritted her teeth as they bounced along the ravine they'd come down. Rick was driving fast, recklessly fast, but Valerie wasn't about to argue with him. She was fairly certain the Terriers didn't know they were there yet. She hadn't gotten anything from them so far, and she was hoping that Rob and Sergei were right and whatever was screwing with the radio signals also interfered with their empathy.

But even if they are right, she thought, there's no telling how far away is far enough.

"—roject," a voice came over the gear, almost unidentifiable through the static. "Somebody answer me, god damn it!"

"Hardy?" Valerie said.

"Finally!" he said. "Yeah! Listen, don't—" The rest was lost in static.

"Say again?" Valerie said.

"—ply pod," he said. "Stay away! Terriers—"

"We saw," Valerie said darkly. "And not just Terriers."

"You saw the rail?" Hardy said, his voice suddenly coming through more clearly.

Valerie checked her tablet. He was coming up the ravine behind them now, about three klicks behind. "Yeah, we saw it. How far are the Terriers behind you?" she asked.

"Um…" Hardy said, "maybe a klick. A little more, I guess."

Rick glanced over at Valerie. "Too close," he whispered.

"I think I'm gaining a little on them, though," Hardy continued. "Listen, have you been able to get through to the others?"

Valerie hesitated, glancing over at Rick. He shook his head.

"Valerie, come on, they need to know what's out there!" Hardy said. "If you haven't gotten through yet, you need to punch it and get to higher ground."

"What are you going to do?" Valerie said, surprised by the direction the conversation was taking.

"I'll try to slow these guys down," Hardy said. "There's a spot along here where I can maybe cut over to another way through the hills. I'll try to lead them along that so you'll have time to get away."

"And then what?" Rick cut in.

"And then I'll run like hell!" Hardy said, sounding like it was obvious. "But I won't lead them back to the others. If it comes to that, I'll get to high ground and hold them off as long as I can. Listen, here in about ten minutes, you need to find some rocks to hide in. I don't want them to know you're here."

"Okay," Valerie said dubiously.

"And if I don't make it back," Hardy said, "tell...aw, hell, it doesn't matter." He cut the channel.

Valerie looked over at Rick. "What the hell?" she said.

Rick shrugged, looking as confused as she felt.

Alonzo arrived back at the convoy late in the afternoon, and despite Melanie's warning, Julia still felt unprepared.

"Just tell him you're sorry to start with," Melanie murmured as Alonzo turned the ATV to pull in beside her.

Julia swallowed hard, then nodded.

Artie hopped off the back of the ATV and gave her an encouraging smile, then trotted off towards where Phoebe was talking to Todd.

Melanie turned to Alonzo, who was sitting sullenly in the ATV. "Be nice. You may not think you owe it to her," she said quietly, "but you owe it to me."

Alonzo looked at her for a long moment, but finally nodded, and Melanie followed Artie.

Julia took a deep breath. "I'm sorry," she said. "I was wrong. I should have talked to you instead of…" She trailed off uncertainly, then shook her head. "You were right. I jumped to conclusions. I didn't think it through."

He looked skeptical. "What happened?"

Julia looked chagrined. "What else? Melanie," she said as if that explained it all. She frowned and looked hard at him. "I need you to explain it to me," she said. "The Dante quote, why it made you so angry. Explain it like I don't have a clue."

Alonzo looked wary. "You're serious," he said.

"Yes," Julia said insistently. "I don't know what you think I intended in bringing it up, but I swear to you, I didn't mean it that way."

Alonzo looked at her for a long moment, and realized she really had no idea. Oh, that's just great, he thought. She might not have thought I was the spy before that, but she sure had reason to after. What a mess. He shook his head. "I figured you must have asked Yale about me, and that's why he said that quote when he got hit by the blast."

"What would I have asked him?" Julia said, suddenly exasperated. "And what could he have told me that would have been so bad?"

"That's just it: if you don't think I'm the spy already, you sure will after I tell you about it," Alonzo said, his jaw clenched.

Julia frowned. "But…" She stopped, shaking her head. "Tell me everything," she said.

Alonzo sighed. Oh, screw it, he thought finally. She's not going to let it go. Just tell her and get it over with. He looked past her to make sure the others had passed beyond earshot, then looked back at her. "I was helping a friend of mine, when I was in the CSF," he said. "During the mission I told you about—when I ended up in the cryopod. I'd nearly gotten myself pulled from the mission when I found out they were using worm bullets."

Her eyes widened, and he looked up at her, nodding. "Yeah, that's why I looked the way I did in the mess tent that day. I never expected to run into worm bullets again anywhere, least of all here."

"What was the mission?" Julia said, and she looked like she was braced for something.

"We were supposed to be strikebreaking, at a mining complex," Alonzo said, clearly uncomfortable with the memory.

"A mining complex," Julia repeated, not looking shocked, but like she'd been expecting it.

"Yeah, one of the asteroid stations. But when we got there, the lieutenant ordered the ground units to use worm bullets. They were going to blow up the whole complex. God, Julia, there were kids in there! I argued with the lieutenant, but Biko told me to shut up. I thought at first he was just going to follow orders, but then he told me he was going to try to get some of the miners out."

"Where?" Julia asked as if it was the most important question in the world. "Which asteroid?"

Alonzo smiled wryly. "That's why the Dante quote made me mad," he said. "I figured you must have gotten Yale to play you the recording." He sighed. "Biko said it to me, right before he went in. Because I'd been talking to him about Dante on the way out there—"

"Alonzo, which asteroid?" Julia repeated insistently.

"Aeneas," Alonzo said. "Since he's the guy who leads Dante through hell, I started telling Biko about it. We had to talk on comm a lot during sims on the way out to Aeneas, and I found out Biko was trying to get into OCS. He needed a college degree, so he was taking classes. When he said he was having trouble with classical lit, I started helping him."

"With Dante?" Julia said.

"Well, sort of. We started out with Shakespeare, and I ended up telling him about Dante and—"

"Alonzo, what happened? Did you get the miners out?"

Alonzo was taken aback by her intensity. "What's this about, Julia?"

"Just tell me," Julia said impatiently.

Alonzo frowned again, but went on. "Biko told me to pick him up at one of the surface hatches. He managed to round up a few of them—half a dozen kids and a few of their parents." He swallowed hard. "I'd just picked 'em up when we got hit. The missile hit the hold, and the whole ship blew apart. I barely made it—the emergency bolts blew the cockpit clear at the last second." He shook his head. "They told me I was lucky. Lucky!" He laughed bitterly, then looked over at Julia, expecting her to be looking at him with disgust or disappointment, but she didn't even look like she'd registered what he'd said. She was looking past him, clearly thinking.

"The man you were helping," Julia said, looking up at him suddenly. "Biko—was he on the ship when it blew up?"

Alonzo shook his head. "He said he had to stay behind, to try to get more people out if he could. I don't know what happened to him. I tried to find out, after I got out of coldsleep, but nobody would tell me anything, and—"

"What year was it when you ended up in the lifepod?" Julia cut in.

"Huh?" he said.

"What year was that? When you first went in, not when they got you out."

He blinked at her. "Why?"

"It was 2134, wasn't it?" she asked.

Alonzo nodded. "Close, anyway. 2133. What's going on, Julia?"

"What happened when you got picked up?" Julia said. "Who picked you up?"

"A mining survey team," he said.

"From the Heller Corporation," Julia said.

Alonzo's eyes went wide. "Is that how you know all this?" he said.

"What happened after they found you?" Julia asked, ignoring the question.

"Um...they brought the pod back to the stations, where they thawed me out." He frowned. "I figured they'd just chuck me out an airlock once they found out who I was, but—"

"But someone helped you," she said. "A man with light brown hair. Mid-thirties. Blue eyes."

"Yeah, really blue," Alonzo said, unnerved. She said she didn't know what I was talking about, but obviously she does. What is she playing at? "Why are you asking all this? You already know it all."

"No," Julia said, shaking her head. "I don't. I'm figuring it out as I go. So how did this man help you? How did you avoid getting thrown out an airlock?"

"I told them I knew they were monitoring the comm, and I planned to get Biko arrested," he said bitterly. He ran his hand through his hair. "The guy who helped me, Mr. Blue Eyes, he told me to do it. He put together a doctored recording that 'proved' it." He looked at her, half-expecting her to step away from him, but she didn't seem at all surprised. "It wasn't true, but I said it anyway, and that and the recording made me look like a Council true believer."

Julia nodded slowly. "You thought I'd heard the recording," she said.

"Yeah," Alonzo said. "The Dante quote was part of it, after all."

"I haven't," Julia said, looking intently at him. "I swear. I didn't know it existed till now."

"Alonzo! Julia!" Devon called over the gear. "Get back up with the rest of us! Right now!"

"What's going on?" Julia said.

"Just get up here," Devon said. "I'll explain when you get here."

Julia climbed onto the back of the ATV and Alonzo pulled out, though he was still clearly rocked by what she'd said.

They caught up with the others quickly. They'd come to a stop, and Devon was standing by the Transrover, listening to Valerie and Rick.

"What is it?" Julia said, hopping off the ATV.

Devon turned to look at her, and her expression was grim. "Terriers," she said.

"Not just Terriers," Valerie said. "They had a Council rail with them. Whoever this group is, it isn't the group that I met. They were camped around the supply pod, waiting for us."

"Where's Hardy?" Alonzo asked.

"That's the other bad news," Rick said. "He was a lot closer to them. He was headed back up to us, but they were right on his—"

"Why would he have been closer to them?" Melanie said. "What was he doing?"

"I don't know," Valerie said. "We'd lost contact with him entirely for almost an hour before we picked up the supply pod signal."

"That doesn't mean anything," Julia said. "We couldn't contact you, either."

"How close are the Terriers?" Devon asked.

Rick shook his head. "We holed up in a bunch of rocks," he said. "I figured if we kept running, we'd just lead them straight to you. So we hid. And Hardy led them away from us."

"How do you know?" Melanie said. "For all we know, he could be leading them straight to us."

Valerie looked uncomfortable. "She's right, Rick. He said he was going to try to keep them away from the group, but..." She trailed off, shaking her head.

Devon looked worried. "How long did you two hide?" she asked.

"Almost an hour," Rick said. "If he was going to bring them down on us, I think he'd have done it by now."

Someone at the front of the crowd gave a shout, and they all turned to see a cloud of dust approaching.

"Damn," Danziger said. "Everybody, grab a mag-pro or a handgun! Get the rails and form a circle around one side of the Transrover!" There was a mad scramble, and Devon grabbed Uly and threw him into the cab of the Transrover.

"Tru, you keep him in there, whatever happens," she said. "I'm counting on you, Tru."

"Mom—" Uly began, but Tru nodded, wide-eyed, and Devon slammed the door shut.

"It's Hardy!" Rick called out, looking out at the setting sun through his monocular.

"Any sign of Terriers?" Danziger said.

"Not so far," Rick said, and soon after, Hardy pulled up.

"Man, am I glad to see you guys," he said climbing out of his rail.

Devon walked up to him. "Hand over your mag-pro, Hardy," she said.

Hardy looked shocked. "What?"

"You heard me," Devon said, and she glanced over her shoulder. Rick, Helen and Rob all leveled their mag-pros at him.

Hardy swallowed. "Look," he said, raising his hands placatingly, "I don't know what you guys think, but I just spent the afternoon trying to shake a bunch of Terriers, so—"

"What I think," Devon said evenly, "is that there's a chance you told those Terriers where we are."

Hardy's face hardened. "I'm not the spy, Adair."

"Maybe you aren't," Devon said. "But until I know for sure there isn't a herd of Terriers and Council agents coming down on us, I'd just as soon have you away from weapons. The mag-pro," she prompted.

There was a tense moment, and then Hardy turned very slowly, took the mag-pro out of the rail, and handed it to her.

Devon took it, turned to Danziger and said, "Take him with you in the rail. The rest of you, we're turning north. I want to get at least another five k in before we stop, so let's get moving." She turned to Alonzo. "I need you and Artie to scout ahead to the north. Okay?"

"Yeah," Alonzo said, though he seemed almost dazed. "Sure." He looked back at Julia.

She nodded at him. "We'll finish our talk when we stop for the night, okay?"

Devon frowned as Alonzo drove off with Artie perched on the back of the ATV. "What was that about?" she asked Julia.

Julia smiled reassuringly. "I'll tell you later, I promise. I need to find out some more first."

"Please tell me it's good news," Devon said feelingly. "I don't think I could take any more bad today."

"I hope so," Julia said. She looked back out at Alonzo. "I really hope so."