He was about to go into the water at night, something her parents had forbidden her and her sisters from ever doing. Scaring them with tales of riptides, whirlpools, and monsters. And of the fact, that if something should ever happen at night, the likelihood of rescue once below the water was minimal.
But she couldn’t take her eyes off the Cyborg who was up to his shins in the glittering waves. His presence set off hundreds of light-swimmers all around him. The bright blue creatures drifted toward shore after dark. Rylie found her hand twitching to throw rocks into the water to set off more.
His skin glows.She was very aware of the jacket still around her shoulders and the penetrating heat that went with it. His unusual, somewhat comforting smell.
Rylie turned around and scurried up the bluff. When she looked back at the ocean, Netto was gone, as if he had never been there to begin with.
It made her a little wistful and a little sad.
Chapter Six
***
The music woke her. Rylie sat up in bed, one moment asleep, the next moment tangled in her blanket as she struggled to get up. Her bedroom door slammed open to reveal her wild-eyed sister.
The holo-clock read three hundred hours and Kepler’s sun had yet to shine through her window.
“We gotta get down to the watership,” her sister yelled as she ran back to her own room, grabbing an already packed bag, and rushing down the hall.
“Wait!” Rylie grabbed her own bag, and without a second thought, went after her. Apparently, she and her sister had come to the same conclusion last night: their da was going to start out without them.
It was dark as she ran from her house down to the docks, knowing her way without guidance, even through the impenetrable early morning fog.
The music still played and it came as a relief when her bare feet hit the dock. The lights of her watership were an easy beacon to guide her to the end. She was following them when her sister’s laughter pealed through the mist.
Not Janet’s, but Lily’s. Her baby sibling collided with her, shrill with excitement that only little kids had, laughing and screaming at the same time. Lily knocked her back a step.
“Woah, you okay?” Rylie wrapped her arms around her sister, who struggled to remain contained.
“I’m gonna getcha!”
Rylie looked up as her sister screamed and was lifted out of her arms. Zeph raised Lily up into the air. “Gotcha.” She couldn’t help but smile seeing her spun around, by a frightening Cyborg, no less.
“You two have become fast friends,” Rylie exhaled and winced at her sister’s high-pitched laughter.
“I’m fast friends with everyone!”
