Netto stepped out of the fog behind Zeph, impeding on their little bubble. Zeph stopped spinning her sister and lifted Lily up instead, placing her on Netto’s shoulders. Rylie had to strain her neck to look up at Lily’s gleeful face. Baby hands ran all over Netto’s shaved head.
He looked serious. An odd contrast to Zeph’s and Lily’s faces. His eyes found hers, ignorant of his partner, and she realized she still wore her oversized nightshirt and shorts.
“It appears you’re the last one to arrive,” Zeph interjected. “I would have wagered on your sister.”
“I want to be a Cyborg!”
“You two are encouraging her.” Rylie ignored her embarrassment under Lily’s excitement.
“Of course we are,” Zeph chuckled. “Who wouldn’t want to be a Cyborg? Look how handsome we are.” He waved his hand between him and Netto. “Although little Lily here is already gorgeous, she would wreak havoc as a Borg, melting everyone’s hearts.”
Rylie laughed. “I guess that could be her special ability. Heart melting.” She ignored Netto and kept her focus on Zeph and her sister, but it was hard when he stared bullets at her, into her. His eyes heated her skin despite the early morning chill.
Lily took that moment to yell out, “I want to fly! And have pointy teeth and be blue.”
“It looks like you’re already flying, little love,” Zeph preened as Lily leaned over Netto’s head and pulled at his lips. It made a funny picture and she wished she had a way to capture the moment.
“Don’t encourage her. You two won’t have to be here to see her heartbroken after you leave,” she laughed.
“I wanna see your teeth.” Lily continued to claw at Netto’s face, who began to shuffle back and forth on his feet to jostle her around.
“How can we leave such a precious beauty behind?” Zeph smirked down at Rylie, and she had the notion he wasn’t speaking about Lily anymore. “That would be a sin if another Cyborg entered her life and took her under his wing. I’d think Netto and I would have tocall him out.”
She decided to ignore Zeph as she stepped past him. Rylie raised her arms to take her sister from Netto’s shoulders. “Time to come down from there, Lily. We have work to do.”
To her sister’s fussy cry, Netto lifted her above his head and handed her over. Lily wailed as her playtime ended. Rylie hugged her writhing limbs while she fought to break free. Being the enemy under the dual gazes of two Cyborgs was uncomfortable, and for the first time she was profoundly happy she wasn’t a Trentian...or a soldier on the wrong side of the field.
Rylie turned and led Lily off the dock and shooed her back up to the house. Their mother retrieved her at the steps of the bluff. When she was safely away, Rylie headed back to the boat, finding the dock empty of strangers.
She stepped up into the watership, and into an array of unusual tech.
The men at work were placing the gear away. She scooted past them and into the housing part of the ship, heading toward her bunk. The watership was made like a tugboat but had some of the amenities of a yacht. There was the top deck at the front, the lower deck in the back where they had spoken the night before, and the bridge in between. She passed through the kitchenette and attached lounge, toward the crew’s quarters.
It was her watership but Da kept the detached captain’s suite. It held a mini-office they both worked in when alone at sea.
She peeked through the open door into an additional room of bunks and stopped short. Inside was one large, open duffle bag.
She sucked in her breath and leaned in to look at it. Her fingers tightened their grip on her own bag as she made out a myriad of things she didn’t know the name for. But they all had the look of something that would be used by a Cyborg.
A hand came around her forearm and she jolted around to face her sister, a finger over her lips. Janet dragged her into their room, shared for now, with both bunks descended from the wall panels. Her sister closed the door behind them and Rylie tossed her bag on her bed.
“What’s with the shush?”
“They can hear,” Janet whispered, turning to face her. “Keep your voice down.”
Rylie’s eyes shifted to the closed door before going back to her sister. “What do you mean they can hear?”
“Because they can. I looked it up on the network last night. They can also see much farther than we can, especially at night.”
“Do you think they can hear us in here?”
“I don’t know.”
She sighed and opened her bag, quickly changing into her swimwear and grunge clothes, feeling moderately more presentable and less bedraggled.
“I don’t like this,” Janet said.
“I don’t either but it’s already done. Netto promised he could fix whatever juju is happening. We can at least give them a chance.”
