Chapter 20

The next afternoon, Raelin reached Lily’s shop with three more points cut from his debt and his left ankle stiff from hours at a sorting stool, but the pain had eased since morning, and he could put more weight on it than he had the day before.

Raelin lifted the canvas and stepped into the shop. Kiri sat alone at the front workbench, bent close to a salvaged connector beneath the lamp. She turned it a fraction at a time, compared each pin with the diagram, and recorded its condition on the sheet beside her. Even when the canvas fell shut behind him, she did not look up.

“Ki.”

Her head came up, concentration giving way to a wide smile. She set the connector back in its bin and jumped up from the bench. Raelin opened his arms, and Kiri rushed into a hug. Her arm pressed against the bruise beneath his ribs, and he flinched.

“Oops.” Kiri took a step back, and her smile faded. “Rae, you look terrible.”

“Good to see you too.” Raelin lowered himself onto a stool and stretched his left leg out beneath the bench. “I was wrong about the Compound.”

Kiri sat back on the bench beside him. “Tell me what happened.”

“I tried my best, Ki. I took the five-point assignments and worked as hard as I could, but I only got worse. Then I twisted my ankle clearing drains.” He pointed at his stretched-out leg.

Kiri’s eyes dropped to his ankle, then to the cuts still healing across his hand. She looked back at him. “So what are we going to do?”

Raelin picked at a loose thread near his knee. “I don’t know.” He worked it between his fingers until it began to fray. “I came here to tell you the Compound wasn’t working. That’s as far as I got.”

One corner of Kiri’s mouth lifted. “That’s not much of a Raelin plan.” She opened the drawer beneath her end of the bench and pulled out her old notebook. Settling it on her lap, she shifted until she was facing him fully. “All right. What have we got to work with?”

Raelin nodded toward the workbench. “We can start with the obvious. The apprenticeship covers food and medicine.”

“Barely. I’m not buying any new toys for a while.” Kiri made a note in the notebook, then pointed her pencil at his outstretched leg. “Second obvious.”

Raelin drew back his foot. “I can still work. Just not the five-point ones every day.”

Kiri worked the numbers in the margin. “Best case, you’re still looking at about two hundred days. Worst case, closer to three hundred and thirty.” She tapped the pencil against the page. “And that’s assuming nothing else goes wrong.”

Raelin leaned forward. “And that’s just to get me back to zero.”

Kiri’s pencil paused over the page. “Right.” She looked at him. “So what are our options?”

“Well, I’m certainly not going on any climbing trips anytime soon.”

“Good catch. Let me just cross that one out real quick.” Kiri made a show of striking through an empty line in the notebook. “What else?”

Raelin held up a hand and folded down one finger at a time. “Factory’s gone. The other salvage sites are stripped, occupied, or claimed. No one in Undertown wants to risk hiring a Pointless. The Compound takes too long. And even if I get back to zero, I’m unlikely to get a job.”

Kiri raised an eyebrow at his hand. “I asked for options, Rae, not your top five things that won’t work.”

Raelin let his hand fall. “Those were the options.”

“I checked if I could send you some of my pay, but the Ledger won’t let me.” Kiri shook her head. “I asked Zane if he had any ideas too. He didn’t, but he said he wants to see you when you get a chance.”

“I’ll find him when I can,” Raelin said.

Kiri chewed on the end of her pencil for a moment, then pulled it from her mouth. “There has to be something we haven’t tried yet.”

“I could ask Lily for more hours,” Kiri suggested.

Raelin shook his head. “We already know your pay can’t touch my debt. And even if Lily gave you more hours, it still wouldn’t get us anywhere near the surgery. We need something that can do both.”

Kiri studied the page. “What about finding another salvage site?”

“Three problems. First, we’d be starting from scratch. I’ve already checked every lead we had left, and finding the factory took us months of dead ends and a fair bit of luck. Second, you’ve got the apprenticeship and I’ve got the Compound, so neither of us can spend whole days searching anymore.” Raelin turned his gray OmniLink toward her. “Third, even if I found something, I can’t turn it in under my own name.”

Kiri added a note to the page. “What about one of the salvage crews? The Cascade, maybe?”

“Those crews work full days. You couldn’t do that safely, and I can’t skip the Compound. And whatever they paid, I doubt it would get us anywhere near the surgery.”

Kiri hesitated. “There’s Kozar.”

Raelin grimaced. “He already got what he wanted from us. I doubt anything else we could do for him would pay surgery wages.” His mouth twitched. “And even if it did, I think I’d rather fight robots than deal with that bastard again.”

Kiri didn’t laugh. Raelin’s beginning smile faded.

“Lily said Jax used to be Pointless,” Raelin said. “Maybe he knows another way out.”

Kiri considered that, then wrote JAX in the notebook. “At least that gives us someone to ask.”

Raelin nodded. “Then we talk to him.”

“When Lily gets back, I’ll ask her how to get in touch with him,” Kiri said.

Raelin glanced at her. “I suppose you’re planning to handle that part too.”

Kiri smiled. “Obviously. I have charm, wit, and excellent people skills.”

Raelin raised an eyebrow. “You just want another look at his arm.”

Kiri scoffed. “You’re thinking too small. I can help you and get another look at his arm. That’s already two good reasons.”

Raelin laughed. “Fine. Just ask him for help before you start taking his arm apart.”

Kiri grinned. “I make no promises.”

Kiri circled JAX. “There. That’s something.”

“When’s Lily back?” Raelin asked. “And how’s she treating you so far?”

“She’s a tyrant.” Kiri nodded toward the salvaged connector. “She keeps me chained to this bench counting pins.”

Raelin winced. “Counting pins? Ki, if I’d known things were this bad, I would’ve come sooner.”

Kiri held out both wrists. “Any minute. Maybe you can negotiate my release.”

Raelin nodded solemnly. “I think I can make a strong case for early release.”

“Request denied,” Lily called from outside the curtain.

She stepped through the curtain, one eyebrow raised. “And remember, I’m always watching.”

Kiri narrowed her eyes. “How long have you been standing out there?”

“Long enough to think the chains should’ve come with a gag,” Lily said.

Lily tipped her chin toward Raelin and gave him a long once-over. “What did you do to yourself this time?”

“The Compound,” Raelin said. “Turns out my brilliant plan worked better on paper.”

Lily folded her arms. “All right. What did you two come up with?”

Kiri turned the notebook so Lily could see the circled name. “Jax.”

Lily turned to Raelin. “Last I heard, robot hunting was suicidal.”

“I’m not signing up for anything,” Raelin said. “He used to be Pointless. Maybe he’s got an idea we haven’t thought of.”

Lily’s arms loosened. “That makes more sense. I can put you in touch with him.”

Lily nodded toward the circled name. “I’ll find out when he’s around.”

Lily woke her OmniLink and sent Jax a message. Beside her, Kiri did the same with Zane. A chime sounded from Kiri’s arm almost immediately.

Kiri checked the reply. “Zane’s close. He says he’ll be by in a few minutes.”

Raelin nodded toward their OmniLinks. “Careful with those. I found out during my trip that off doesn’t actually mean off.”

Lily let her OmniLink fade. “You know, loot boy, you could’ve just asked.”

“I’ll try to remember that next time,” Raelin said.

Kiri lifted her pencil. “Want me to write that down for you?”

“Let’s try Jax first,” Raelin said. “If that doesn’t work out, then we can revisit all my bad decisions.”

“Good,” Lily said. “While we wait, you can make yourself useful.”

She set a tray of salvaged components in front of Raelin. As he sorted through them, Kiri started telling him what Lily had been teaching her, with Lily correcting her whenever Kiri made it sound like she’d mastered in a few days what everyone else needed years to learn. Before long, Raelin was listening to the two of them argue over inspection rules, repair logs, and how much of Kiri’s scavenging experience should count toward her training.

Raelin had made it halfway through the tray when Zane pushed through the curtain.

Zane stopped when he saw Raelin. “Oracle’s wisdom, boy.” He crossed the shop and pulled him into a long hug. When he let go, he looked Raelin over. “You look terrible.”

Raelin managed a smile. “I’ve had better weeks.”

“I gathered that.” Zane kept a hand on his shoulder. “Kiri told me enough to worry. You can tell me the rest.”

Raelin set the tray aside and told him the rest. He skimmed over the climb and spent longer on what came after, reaching the top, waking with the gray OmniLink, and trying to make the Compound work. Zane mostly listened, but whenever Raelin brushed past the worst of it, he made him go back. Eventually, Raelin reached the twisted ankle and admitted the Compound wasn’t working.

Zane shook his head. “Next time it gets that bad, you send for me, boy. I mean it.”

Lily’s OmniLink chimed. She checked the message. “Jax is in town. Says he can meet you in two days.”

Zane glanced at Raelin’s ankle. “Good. Then give that two days to heal as much as the Compound lets you.”

Raelin glanced at the clock on the workshop wall and pushed himself up from the stool. “I need to get going. I should get back before curfew.”

Kiri closed her notebook. “I’ll walk with you for a bit.”

“Go on,” Lily said. “But I’m not paying you to walk your brother the whole way.”

Kiri stood. “See? Tyrant.”

Zane nodded toward the curtain. “I’ll make sure she turns around before then.”

Kiri and Zane headed through the curtain. Raelin started after them, then stopped and looked back at Lily.

“Thanks again. For taking care of Ki.”

Lily glanced toward the workbench. “Trust me, I’m getting the better end of that deal.”

Raelin smiled. “I’ll come back for more bickering another day.”

Lily smiled back. “I’m counting on it.”

Raelin ducked through the curtain and caught up with them on the stairs.

“Apparently fixing something doesn’t count unless you fill out three forms afterward,” Kiri was saying to Zane.

“Are those Lily’s words?”

“Well, not exactly.”

They kept walking while Kiri told them about her first days at the shop. Before they reached Undertown, she slowed.

“I should get back,” Kiri said.

She hooked an arm around his shoulders, keeping clear of his ribs. Raelin wrapped an arm around her and pulled her close.

“See you tomorrow, Rae.”

“I’ll come as soon as I’m done.”

Kiri let him go and headed back toward the Technical Quarter.

Raelin watched Kiri disappear around the bend, then fell into step beside Zane. For a while, the only sound between them was the uneven rhythm of Raelin’s steps.

“Boy,” Zane finally said. “Kiri’s doing all right. Lily’s looking out for her, and you know I will too.”

Raelin stopped and looked at him. Zane took another step, then turned when Raelin didn’t follow.

“What you did was stupid. You’re lucky the Oracle stopped at Pointless. You might never have made it back.”

“I know. I just…” Raelin’s shoulders sagged. “I didn’t see another way.”

Zane gave a quiet, rueful laugh and shook his head. He reached out and rested a hand on Raelin’s shoulder. “You sound like my brother.”

Raelin leaned into Zane. His uncle drew him close, one hand settling at the back of his head. Raelin let his weight rest there, and Zane’s arm tightened around him.

When Raelin finally straightened, Zane kept an arm around him. “Come on. Let’s get you back.”