He lowers his gaze obediently. Carefully. I regret the words immediately. Not because they are wrong. Because they worked.
His attention moves away from me and settles on the basin beyond the shade. The air between us cools by a fraction that has nothing to do with temperature.
It’s good, because I can breathe now. I hate that I preferred when I couldn’t.
I fold the food wrap. The water skin feels heavier than it should when I cap it.
“We need to mark what we found,” I say.
Kavor looks back.
“Black vein,” I continue. “Ash-gray residue. No scent. No glow at two sites. No dead strands. No harvest cuts. No feeding scars.”
He nods once.
“And the rhythm,” I say.
His face goes still. There. The thing neither of us wants to name.
“Once,” I say. “Pause. Again.”
“Yes.”
“That’s not zemlja.”
I expect him to argue but he doesn’t. His silence is worse. A chill crawls under the heat on my skin.
“You know it isn’t,” I say.
“I know it does not move like zemlja.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
“No.”
I hate his no almost as much as his yes.
“We should return,” I say.
The words come out before I know I am going to say them. Kavor does not react. I keep talking because silence will make me hear myself.
“Not to quit. To report. Two dead signs and black residue are enough to change the mission. We have information. We can bring more people. Better tools. More water. Someone who understands old machines if this is machine-related. Someone from Rosalind’s group who knows off-world methods.”
Kavor watches me.
“What?” I demand.
“You do not want to return.”
“Want is irrelevant.”
“No.”
I bare my teeth. “That again.”
“You want to continue.”
“I want the City to survive.”
