Page 39 of Uprooted
“Then what are you doing? This relationship could jeopardize your future.” He sighs heavily, looks around, leans in and continues. "Rules are a good thing. They keep us in line. Breaking rules leads to very real consequences." Tai absentmindedly rubs his bionic triceps.
He's never told me what happened to his arm, and I've never asked. I figured if he wanted me to know he'd tell me. He's had it since we met—day one of Intros. It's so much a part of him, it would seem odd at this point if he had two blue arms.
Maak and Lugo come to a stop in front of me, both out of breath from the run.
“Sir. Do you want me to take my turn carrying Maak now?” Lugo asks as he takes a gulp of water.
“Not necessary. We’re moving on.”
“Sir, I can do the heavy lifting,” Lugo nervously looks between Maak and me. “I mean, obviously, I know you have a great reason fordoing it this way… I don’t mean to question your call, sir. So, what I guess, I’m saying is—”
“I agree, except for the blatant ass-kissing.” Maak cuts him off, still struggling to catch his breath, glaring at me.
“You want to run, recruit, go ahead. Six more intervals. Maak, you stay here and give me a hundred pushups.” Lugo looks over at Maak with an apology.
“Don’t look at him, look at me. Go!” I yell.
“Message received, sir. No more hazing the new guys,” Maak says as he drops to the ground.
25
Elowen
“I got a message from the Earth Galactic Alliance,” Andi says not looking up. Her tone makes me nervous as it suggests she isn’t happy to hear from the world organization funding our research.
“That doesn’t sound good.”
“They're concerned that we aren’t making progress fast enough,” she says, finally looking up from her microscope. She pushes back from the desk and pulls her goggles off to rub her eyes. She looks so tired.
“We have been making a ton of progress!” I say.
“Not enough, according to the fucking EGA.”
“More resources would help. They could send more staff so we could go twice as fast,” I suggest.
“It would take too long for another team to arrive. I have an idea…” She drifts off, deep in thought.
“What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to ask for an exception to allow me to leave the muradome for some field observation. Maybe there is something out there that we aren’t seeing in here,” she says.
“Can I come?” I would love to get out in the field. The dome has been feeling claustrophobic for a while now.
“I want you to stay here and keep chipping away. This could be a total bust, and I don’t want to fall behind in the lab.”
I swallow down the rising disappointment that bubbles up. She’s right. Now’s not the time to slow down because I want to take a field trip.
“Why the sudden rush? Did something happen?” I ask.
“They didn’t say. I got the impression it had more to do with politics than anything else. It might be enough to get me an escort out for a few hours,” Andi says. “Elowen, we’re going to figure this out.”
“I know.” I give her a weak smile.
We go back to our microscopes and work in silence next to each other. The thought of how many people will suffer while they wait for us to figure this out hangs in the room. I try not to think about what happened the last time a major crop failed. I need to stay focused. Wecando this. I repeat the mantra in my head the rest of the afternoon.We can do this.
26
Aro
