Lament takes one look at the spaceship, stands up, and leaves the room.
Toph rubs his beard. “This changes things.”
“Yeah,” I reply faintly.
“Oh, Keller.” Vera scratches dismayed fingers across her scalp. “If that’s really a BlackWing, wiring you won’t work.”
BlackWings are crafted from korathamite, Jester explains.The material is designed to block communication reception. Once you’re on board, we’ll have no way to know if you’re in trouble.
“And even if we did,” Avi adds, “we wouldn’t be able to come for you.”
“You’re a pyrotechnician,” I tell Avi in a voice that is trying its very hardest not to be a whine. “Can’t you just, you know”—I wave my hand around—“blast it to pieces?”
“Are you familiar with the termplucking feathers off a bald chicken?”
“I thought you were supposed to be the best.”
Avi gives me a withering look. “Iam.”
Vera pulls her lip between her teeth. “Jester? Is there a workaround?”
Every BlackWing uses its own form of wire interference, Jester says.I could maybe break into this one, but I’d need time. And if not…He goes still.I’ve just had an idea.He stands on long legs and rushes off.
“All right.” Vera claps her hands. “We have less than three days to get Keller prepared for his jaunt onto The Parallax, with emphasis on this new development of BlackWing-level security. If”—she looks at me—“you’re still doing this?”
I don’t hesitate. “I’m still doing this.”
The next forty-eight hours pass in a blur of secret meetings and research sessions and too many energy drinks to count. Jester works on breaking through The Parallax’s interference network, Toph equips Moon Dancer with accelerated tracking systems, and the Youvu Hums plot how to distract the sergeant long enough to get us out of the detachment without notice, which involves, of all things, feathers, oil, and a length of rope. At some point, our group migrates from Lament’s room into Moon Dancer’s workshop, and I pore over old articles written about Ran Doc Min, his followers, what little is known about his simulation. Occasionally, I glance at the door, but Lament never shows up.
“Tesser Lane is an arachnidadia,” Avi tells me late one evening. I’m perched on an overturned crate in the workshop listening to Avi enumerate on Ran Doc Min’s closest known cronies while trying to memorize as much of what she’s saying as my brain can manage. I feel stuffed, overripe, but with only thirteen hours left before I’m due on The Parallax, I can’t afford to miss a thing.
Avi scribbles nonsense on her whiteboard as she continues. “Being an arachnidadia—a nonhuman species from Planet Orador—means Tesser can communicate with arachnids. Apparently, she’s trained an army of spiders to do her bidding.” Avi gives me an appraising look. “How many spiders would you like crawling on you at one time?”
“Um,” I say. “Ideally, none.”
“You have to pick a number.”
“My number is zero. I would like zero spiders.”
“Then there’s Jij,” Avi continues without pause, drawing lots of looping circles that, again, mean nothing. “They’re another nonhuman blend of extraterrestrials we haven’t been able to identify. Possibly born from some sort of splicing experiment. First of their kind. They have over twenty high-profile kills on their record, and they like to use poison. If they give you anything to eat or drink, donot.”
I lean back and cross my arms, eying the eleven-year-old. “How do you know all this?”
“It’s part of my job as spymaster.”
“But I thought—”
“Keller,” Vera interrupts. “Jester has something for you.”
Jester’s usually kempt hair is a frizzy mess, his clothes hanging sadly on his thin frame. Like the rest of us, he looks like he hasn’t showered or slept in two days, because he hasn’t. He holds out what appears to be a small tangle of roots.
Be grateful I was able to get my hands on one of these at such short notice, he says, handing me the object.It will allow you to communicate with us while you’re on The Parallax. It’s biological—not technological—so The Parallax’s anticommunication shields won’t be able to interfere.
The item is small, barely the size of my thumbnail. It looks like a ball of wet fuzz. “But what is it?”
It’s called a keening. It’s a type of fungus. Or, really, it’s both the name of the fungus and the name of the organism itself. Keening is actually a single organism that’s split into hundreds of separate pieces, like this one, but remains connected. It’s—or they’re? Sorry, the etymology gets confusing—it’s very sensitive to its surroundings. That piece of keening can feel the energy of a place, and it’ll react accordingly, growing smaller and darker in times of stress, vibrating if it’s in pain, turning white when it’s happy. Sinceall keenings are really just one organism, if a part of keening is affected, all of it is. If you have that piece—he motions to the fungus in my hand—and I have this piece—he extracts a slightly larger wad from his pocket—we’ll be able to sense what’s going on with each other.
“I… this is great and all,” I say, bobbing my head in an I’m-really-impressed-and-definitely-not-doubting-this-plan sort of way, “but I’m seeing a few potential… um, I have questions. Like, what if I’m just nervous but not in danger?”
