Juncture
Oh man the technicians on the Beacon station were pissed.
When we’d dropped the ‘conscious Beacons’ bombshell on them the first time, we hadn’t stuck around for long. Evidently, they’d been counting on us to prepare for the next wakeful period.
But the Beacon’s consciousness was massive. Even with eight of us, it could still support time dilation that completely dulled whatever self-awareness I had in my body.
The scientists would have to wait thirty seconds while I got all my people on the same page.
“You guys remember how I skated the question when you asked what all happened to me?” I asked my fellow abductees.
“No,” at least four of them said.
I glanced Jordan, pleadingly.
“I don’t know…I’m trying to remember if you said something like that…” she deadpanned.
Nai snickered and I shot her a glare.
“Point is, it’s a long story, and this is the most effective way to tell it,” I said.
The Beacon’s borrowed face lit up.
“Movie night!”
The scene around us changed in a blur. We all found ourselves swept into cushy seats, and the blank void turned into a theater, complete with red carpet and everything.
This show was not a short one, but luckily we had snacks as good as our imagination and no need to pause for the head.
I tried not to let my stomach turn when I realized it wasn’t a movie theater, but stage theater the likes of which were only possible in a space forged of pure thought, fueled by the combined imagination of eight aliens and a bioengineered alien brain the size of a skyscraper.
It wasn’t a stage for showing stories, it was for showing memories. Costumes were perfect, all the timing was exactly as I remembered it, and all my worst moments were…not all there…
Huh.
This was not an unabridged story, and I couldn’t have been more grateful to the Beacon for skipping my most miserable moments—especially all the moments with a still alive Daniel on our abduction ship.
Nai didn’t miss that fact either. We skipped over the friction we’d had for the months on Yawhere. Most notably absent was her throwing me through a wall.
The event’s absence was still a reminder, and she was polite enough to look mortified to recall it.
My stage fright was a thing of the past, but seeing myself from the audience’s perspective made my gut twitch in a concerning way.
Endure it… I thought. My real body and gut were practically frozen in time. This was just my imagination dredging up bad memories.
Everyone else was absorbed in the various misadventures I’d crawled my way through. Coalescence on Draylend was the high point. I could tell how the display drew more on Nai’s memories. Whether that was through my own link to her at the time or her presence now, I wasn’t sure.
I figured there would be more questions, but everyone seemed very absorbed in the show. Were our attention spans being affected by whatever the Beacon did, or did attention work off real time?
From our perspective, the show was several hours long, but in real time, the whole thing took less than thirty seconds. Who couldn’t pay attention to something for thirty seconds?
When everyone was caught up, I asked, “any questions?”
They glanced between themselves. Andre raised a hand.
“Yes?”
“You’re getting rid of us,” he accused. A glance at Jordan confirmed she hadn’t told them. I suppose I couldn’t be mad because they’d been paying attention.
“That’s true,” I said.
“Why? I get why it might be unsafe to stay with you guys if you keep going on rescue missions,” he said, frowning. “But why are you sending us to this Nora chick? She betrayed you.”
I bit my cheek, unsure how to answer.
“…Betrayal is complicated,” Nai supplied for me. “I was there. She hurt Caleb, but that isn’t necessarily the same thing as betrayal.”
“I don’t get it…” he said. He wasn’t the only one.
“If someone tells you exactly what they want, and you’re too dumb to listen, is it really a betrayal when they try to do exactly that?” I asked. “She might have broken my trust on some things, but keeping you guys safe isn’t one of them. Fact is she’s prepared to take care of lots of abductees and…we are not.”
The kids all wore the same expression. Even Jordan. It took me a moment to work out exactly what was going through their minds.
They were being asked to accept something they didn’t like…but they were accepting it. Because they trusted me. I hadn’t known them forty-eight hours, but they trusted me enough to dislike Nora just having learned what she’d done to me.
“…Okay,” Andre said.
A chill went through me.
We weren’t really Coalesced right now. Linking to the Beacon like this only required a fraction of the superconnector’s abilities. But I couldn’t help but fear that linking to minds like this didn’t have some ominous implications about trust…
This was just a hunch…but I believe I’d need to be careful about exactly who I Coalesced with in the future.
“So…when’s this happen?” Jessie asked.
“Captain Serral said your ride’s a few hours late. Shame too, because it means they’re going to miss our friend here being awake,” I said, high-fiving not-Titus.
“So if the Beacon is awake for another seven hours, what should we do while it’s awake?” Logan asked.
“Good question,” I said. “Actually, hang on. Someone outside just tapped my shoulder.”
The one tap was enough to call me out, nobody just tapped once. Connecting to the Beacon just dilated time enough that it might be another few hours from my perspective before the second tap.
I dragged myself out of the Beacon’s thoughtspace and snapped back into my own body.
“Is it working?” the technician asked. “Are you talking to—”
“Give me five seconds,” I said, diving back in.
I couldn’t be sure exactly how much time had passed in the seconds it took to speak to the Beacon tech. But in my absence the kids had suckered the Beacon into brainstorming possible names together. I wasn’t surprised not-Titus hadn’t settled on a name yet. The Beacon didn’t seem too troubled I hadn’t either. Maybe the kids would have fun with it.
Then again…there were some potential pitfalls.
Not to self: make sure they run possibilities by someone older.
Not-Titus caught my…’eye’? Attention. They caught my attention, giving me a knowing gaze.
‘Take it slow’, the look said.
I smiled. The Beacons might be new to sapience, but they were not unintelligent.
“Nai,” I beckoned. “Help me out with the station personnel?”
“Sure,” she said.
·····
Devising a more accessible communication method for the Beacon techs took the better part of an hour, a fact those same techs became more irate about when they learned about the time dilation of my superconnector.
‘The hours wasted!’
I heard that more than once.
Truth was, I felt bad. I wanted to hurry up and get to what came next. Spending time under time-dilation with the Beacon would turn half-a-day’s wait into a week if I let it.
Not-Titus was a good sport about it though. They had a grand time talking with Casti for the first time. The technicians’ reactions to Starspeak being the Beacon’s second language were downright hilarious. Not quite offended, but the impulse to protest was clearly present.
We talked a lot of psionic shop, but not-Titus couldn’t tell me much about my intraneural structure theory. But by their own admission, they didn’t have the strongest grasp of proto-psionics or the genuine article.
Our seven hours were through all too soon, all parties having gorged themselves on information.
Using the superconnector for most of that window left me tapped, so I grabbed a nap on the Jack while we waiting for Dustin’s ship to arrive.
·····
Once I woke up, I waited in the station’s communication booth. I wanted to be ready the minute he showed.
It was my first time seeing a ship emerge from a skip, and it was less of a spectacle than I expected.
If the exact spot hadn’t been pointed out to me beforehand, I would have missed the faint white bubble that flickered into existence in the distance. A ship tore through it from the inside—like a chick bursting out of an egg, and the bubble was gone as quickly as it had appeared.
“Ship ID… Uhreez,” ground control faltered. They didn’t know how to pronounce the name.
“This is the Ares,” a Vorak voice replied. “We read you. Direct us for landing. We’re expected.”
That they were.
I ducked out of the room to go meet Dustin at the elevator matching their landing point.
The Beacon was really one long cylinder, and artificial gravity was such that ‘down’ was always perpendicular to the cylinder’s axis. So the Jack and Ares were landed on opposite sides of the cylinder with the airlocks taking the form of lifts that rose to the level of and connected to the ship’s exterior hatches.
Station security showed up too, since this was a ship coming from a Vorak-occupied system, but we were all on the same page.
The elevator doors opened, and I was greeted by several new faces and one familiar one.
Tox.
The three humans accompanying him realized the problem immediately and froze.
I wasn’t going to pick a fight. But, oh boy, there wasn’t a lot that would give me satisfaction like breaking a few of his teeth.
I would just have to comport myself… diplomatically.
“…I thought I caught a whiff of ocean garbage and pond scum,” I said. “The smell seemed out of place, but your presence explains it perfectly, Tox.”
“Well I’m sure you need things explained to you often,” Tox said, without missing a beat. “If there’s more that’s too much for you, I’ll be happy to speak slowly and use plenty of [crayons] so you don’t get lost.”
Of the three humans with Tox, the dude had to be Dustin, and he was the only one grinning. The two girls looked mortified. They weren’t alone.
Security had decided to welcome our Vorak visitors, and trading insults had them skittish.
“This isn’t going to turn into a fight, is it?” one asked.
“Not on my account,” Tox said. “What about you, Caleb? Is my presence unforgivable?”
“…Your company is redeeming,” I said cooly, walking over to Dustin.
I fist bumped him.
“[Nice to meet in person, Dustin,]” I said. Glancing at the two girls with him, I asked, “[Introduce me?]”
“[Caroline, Michelle, this is Caleb,]” Dustin said, still grinning. “[You know? That guy we saw kick a whole lot of Vorak ass?]”
Dustin threw a cocky look at Tox, but the Adjutant didn’t respond.
“[Yeah, we know,]” the first girl—Caroline—said exasperatedly.
“[I didn’t realize anyone else saw all that,]” I said. “[Video from orbit?]”
“[Satellite something or other,]” Dustin nodded. “[It was pretty epic to see. I want to try getting a recording. You know how viral that would go back home?]”
“[Maybe don’t go mentioning that so much?]” Caroline said. “[Let the hatchet stay buried for fuck’s sake.]”
“[Sorry, game recognizes game,]” Dustin said.
“[Kicked some ass of your own?]” I asked curiously. I hadn’t heard much of their group’s interactions with the Rak.
“[No, not like that,]” he said. “[So, what’s the first order—oh…sorry. I’m getting a headache.]”
“[It’s the station air,]” I said. “[It’s set to Casti default, which doesn’t leave us a lot of oxygen. You three’ll want air masks or you’ll get altitude sickness soon enough.]”
I gestured to the fashion piece I wore.
“[We haven’t needed them on Archo,]” Caroline frowned. “[Or on the ship.]”
“[Well the enclave probably has an air barrier for the property,]” I said. “[And your Vorak chauffeurs probably set the Ares’ air to Vorak standard which has more oxygen.]”
“[So why doesn’t Toxic Personality here need a mask?]” Dustin asked.
I spared Tox a glance.
“[Vorak homeworld has more oxygen than ours,]” I said. “[But the otters also have a long history of diving. Their lungs are more efficient with what they take in. They can breathe well enough even in Casti standard atmosphere. But for us, it’s like hanging out at Machu Picchu.]”
“[Ah. Okay. Well don’t sweat it. I’m pretty sure we’ve got masks like that on the Ares,]” Dustin said.
“[I’ll grab-b them-m,]” Michelle said, ducking back into the elevator.
“[Just how many Vorak came with you?]” I asked, trying to scope out the Ares psionically.
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
“[Crew of fourteen not including the four of us,]” Dustin said. “[The station operators on this side of the skip wouldn’t allow any Red Sails personnel to board the station, so they’re staying on the Ares.]”
“[How does that not include him?]” I asked, jutting my head toward Tox.
“I resigned my commission,” Tox said. “Formally speaking, I’m no longer a member of the Red Sails.”
Interesting. Either his English was good enough to follow our conversation, or he was sharp enough with the psionic dictionary to brute force a translation in real time.
“[It’s true,]” Dustin said. “[Get this though, he’s not actually a diplomat for the Vorak to us. He volunteered to join our diplomatic delegation to the Vorak. Nora actually signs his paychecks now. How hilarious is that?]”
I didn’t want to, but that actually did make me crack a smile, even if it probably didn’t show behind my mask.
“[…I assume you were asking about our first order of business?]”
“[Yeah,]” Dustin said.
“[First priority is to sit all of us down and get on the same page,]” I said.
I sent a message to Nai just for heads up.
I said.
As long as you moved parallel to the Beacon’s axis, the station wasn’t too disorienting. But walking around it to find an empty conference room made my headache worse. It looked like everyone else found it about as disorienting as I did, but what consolation was that?
When we finally found a spot, we all plopped into slightly-disproportional chairs intended for Casti bodies. Some of us might have been older, but everyone had equal seating for this conference.
My heart squeezed, seeing how seriously the youngsters scooted right up to the table. They were all business.
Six humans rescued from Cammo-Caddo, three visiting from Archo, and one little old me. It had been more than a year since I’d seen ten humans all in one place. I had to be careful not to cry.
…Ten living humans. How long had it been since I escaped Korbanok? Fourteen months? Fifteen? Not long enough.
I eyed Nora’s delegation a bit more than the ones the Jack crew had rescued. Dustin seemed a bit older than me, but I was definitely older than Caroline. Except Michelle was visibly older than all of us. She had to be at least twenty-one. Maybe as much as twenty-five.
But despite that, Dustin was clearly the one in their driver’s seat. We each introduced ourselves only for Dustin to notice the six from Cammo-Caddo weren’t wearing air masks like we were.
“[Why aren’t you guys altitude sick?]” he frowned.
“[Just spent a few months on a planet terraformed for Casti,]” Jordan said. “[Got headaches nonstop for the first few weeks, but we acclimated eventually.]”
Dustin looked like he might grumble about that, but instead launched into what sounded like reluctantly delivered bad news.
“[Okay, the first things we need to cover is going to be disappointing to you younger five—I don’t know, maybe Jordan too, but—]”
“[You’re taking us back to Archo,]” Andre said. “[We already knew that.]”
Dustin blinked.
“[Oh. Okay. Well, we might have less to talk about than I thought. Getting you guys to the enclave is half the reason we came out here.]”
Before I could subtly prod at what the other half was, Jessie beat me to it.
“[What’s the other half?]” she asked. Zero hesitation, purely innocent.
Dustin didn’t look so eager to answer that question, and Michelle didn’t look eager to talk at all, leaving only Caroline to field that question.
“[…To see if Caleb is doing alright,]” she said.
“[Nora’s that worried about me?]” I chuckled.
“[Believe me when we say this?]” Caroline said. “[We are all worried about you.]”
I opened my mouth to say they didn’t really know me much, but thought better of it. What little I knew of Nora’s campers was that they were from the same pod of four abduction ships that I was. It’s just their ships all had survivors in the double digits. But for months with just three ships of abductees accounted for, they’d deduced the presence of a fourth ship somewhere: my ship.
Even if they didn’t know me, personally, they had been thinking about and trying to help me even when they were powerless.
I didn’t want to be ungrateful for that.
“[I appreciate the concern,]” I said. “[But I appreciate this help more. We know I can’t just go back to Archo with you. Even if it were safe for me, someone needs to keep tracking down abductees in the systems your Vorak help can’t reach.]”
Even if I could have gone to the enclave, Nora’s crew were kind enough to avoid touching on why I wouldn’t.
Or maybe they didn’t know.
I couldn’t say for sure. My correspondence with Dustin hadn’t hinted one way or the other.
“[We’re not just worried about your safety,]” Dustin said. “[We’re worried about your sanity. You’ve had so little human exposure in the last few months…]”
He trailed off awkwardly. Being delicate?
“[Caleb, if I said something that sounds bad and seems to disparage the alien friends you’ve been traveling with, would you trust that that wasn’t my intention, and that I’m purely interested in your welfare, physical and mental?]”
“[Yes,]” I said. This had not been unexpected. He’d hinted as much.
“[You’ve spent too godamn long as a fish out of water. You’ve had so little human contact since you got abducted, I was a little worried you might forget how to speak English,]” he said.
“[We’re all fish out of water,]” I said.
“[Yeah, but those of us at the Mission are swimming in a school, and you are all on your lonesome and sharks patrol these waters.]”
“[…I think your metaphor got away from you,]” I said. “[But fact is, if we’re going to talk about if my alien allies are being supportive enough, they should get to be in the room. But if you’re worried about there not being enough humanity in my orbit, I’m pretty sure someone has something they want to broach…]”
I not-so-subtly glanced at Jordan, prompting her.
She nervously took a deep breath.
“[I don’t want to go to Archo,]” she said, mainly addressing the kids. “[I want to keep flying on the Jack and look for my sister. She was abducted too. If that was all, I don’t think it would be such a big deal, but if I stay, it would be unfair to ask you guys to go to the Archo enclave…but I’m going to be unfair anyway.]”
I grimaced. Nai and I had known this was likely from the moment Jordan debriefed with us. How were we supposed to tell the kids that they should split up with the oldest among them?
“[…We know that too,]” Elaine said. “[Promise you’ll write?]”
It was my turn to blink. Jordan was equally surprised.
“[You guys aren’t upset?]” she asked, bewildered.
“[Sure, we’re upset,]” Elaine said. “[But it’s the obvious answer. Caleb can use the help, you want to find your sister, and we need to be somewhere that you don’t have to worry about us.]”
“[Caroline’s right,]” I said. “[We’re going to worry no matter what.]”
“[We’re young, not stupid,]” Logan said. “[It sucks, but the alternative sucks more…so…why are we still talking about this?]”
“[Because we can’t just do whatever we want on our own,]” I said. “[Our actions affect the rest of the abductees.]”
Jordan nodded. “[Caleb’s right. I said I want to stay on the Jack, but it’s not my decision alone. If any of you—and I mean any of you,]” she turned to Nora’s crew, “[have a problem with that…I’ll suck it up and have Caleb look for Drew instead. But I think I can help.]”
“[…I’ve got no problem with it,]” Dustin said. “[If Nora wouldn’t have killed me for it, I’d have volunteered to go with Caleb myself.]”
Caroline snorted. “[That’s half the reason I came along. Keep you from ditching out to go fight actual space pirates…]”
“[No ob-bjections here,]” Michelle stuttered.
I frowned. That didn’t seem normal. What I sensed of her psionics stuttered along with her speech.
“[…I don’t know if I’m convinced,]” I said. “[I don’t really care about your age—you could be older than I am. But if you’re going to fly with the Jackie Robinson, you need to know that you won’t be safe.]”
“[I talked to Nai,]” Jordan said. “[I’m not going to try and throw myself into danger or fighting…I can be a total noncombatant. Like Shinshay.]”
“[That’s not exactly what I mean,]” I said. “[It’s good that you’ve thought about those risks, but you need to understand exactly what I mean. I’m not saying you ‘might’ be in danger, I’m not saying your safety ‘might’ be at risk. You. Will. Not. Be. Safe. Flying where we might, you could die. Shinshay might not be suited for fighting, but do you understand that they’re very literally risking their life to fly on our ship, study human technology, and learn psionics? Shinshay decided that dying would be better than missing out on those opportunities. So please understand that if you’re flying with us, your death is a very real possibility. Your safety is not guaranteed. You could die only for your sister to turn up somewhere else a few weeks later. Is that something you’re prepared for?]”
“[…Now your metaphor fell apart,]” Dustin said. “[She can’t be prepared for that…she’d be dead.]”
“[Pedantics,]” I said, shaking my head. “[Put it this way, Jordan, it’s not just your life you’ll be risking. It’ll be mine too, and every other crewmate on the Jack. If a crisis hits, and you aren’t ready? And believe me, there will be things you can’t be ready for—if that happens, then someone else might die because you came along wanting to help. Are you prepared to deal with that kind of disaster?]”
I knew Dustin to be cavalier, but even he went silent at that.
“[…No,]” Jordan said. “[I don’t think you can be prepared to deal with that. And honestly, I might not even be prepared to risk my life. But no guarantee of safety? Come on…you aren’t going back to Archo because you think some Vorak might take what you did on Draylend personally, and there’s nothing you could do to stop it. Guaranteed safety? I won’t have that even if I don’t stay on the Jack.]”
“[…For better or for worse…]” I said slowly. “[That is the right answer. No objection from me.]”
“[Then it’s up to you kids,]” Dustin said to the five youngsters.
“[Can we talk about it in private?]” Alan asked.
<[Sure,]> I said, reminding them.
“[You promise not to listen in?]” Jordan asked. How’d she known I could? Oh right. She’d sat in on our tactical retrospective.
“[Yes,]” I said, and to my surprise, I meant it.
The five of them huddled on their half of the table, still emoting their faces while they talked, but not moving their lips an inch.
They went back and forth until eventually one by one, the five of them all said, “[no objection...]”
“[Then welcome to the crew,]” I said.
“[So, what’s next?]” Caroline said.
“[Chat,]” Dustin said. “[These seven weary souls probably haven’t gotten to talk about anything Earthly in months. What did everyone like back home? Movies? Games? Books?]”
“[The six of us were in contact with each other on Cammo-Caddo,]” Jordan said. “[We told each other stories on the psionic channels the pirates didn’t know how to decode.]”
I smiled.
“[This set of eight?]” I asked, pulsing a signal on the channels in question.
“[Yeah!]” Elaine smiled. “[The ones that need a password.]”
“[What’s so special about those eight?]” Caroline asked.
“[I password protected them,]” I said. “[They’re accessible with the default transmitter, but they’re locked behind some Earth trivia. It only takes answers in English too.]”
“[Or you can just pull apart the entire transceiver and just put it back together without the lock,]” Dustin said.
“[That’s what you did, huh?]” I teased. “[You couldn’t name half the U.S. presidents? State capitals? Or MLB teams?]”
“[Oh my God, the Jackie Robinson makes more sense now…]” Caroline laughed.
We had a good time just…hanging for an hour. There was still a lot to do, and sooner rather than later people came knocking to drag us into another discussion. We filed out the door and I caught Caroline’s eye while we walked.
<[What’s the other half for you?]> I asked silently. The eight password channels weren’t the only secret feature in the psionic transceiver. I broadcast to her on a channel that was invisible to anyone who wasn’t a direct recipient of a message.
<[What do you mean?]>
<[You said half the reason you came was to keep Dustin in line. What’s the other half?]>
<[You ask like you already know,]> she replied.
<[…I think Nora sent you to find out how upset I am. I think you’re her. The girl she talked about.]>
<[I am,]> she conceded. <[Wasn’t trying to hide it, but yeah.]”
<[And?]>
<[And what?]>
<[What’s your verdict?]>
<[My verdict is I’ve known you for an hour. Give me some time to actually read the assignment, why don’t you?]>
<[…How much did she tell you about what she did?]> I asked.
<[The way she tells it…she just about killed you,]> Caroline said.
I took a deep breath to steady myself, trying to let anything from my conversation show on my face.
<[What else?]>
<[Specifics? I don’t know. She said she paralyzed you, tried to drag you with her, and that you broke free. She had to launch without you.]”
<[…There’s a lot to unpack there,]> I said. <[But I’ll go ahead and dial on the ‘paralysis’ part. Do you know how?]”>
<[Adept trick. Overrode your nerves,]> she said.
<[I’m surprised you call it paralysis then,]> I said. <[Because the truth is she hijacked my body by materializing foreign cells inside my nerves. Literally hijacked my body from the inside out. The only reason you can call it paralysis is because Nora didn’t have the fine control to keep Nai paralyzed and puppet my limbs at the same time. She only had the bandwidth to paralyze us both.]>
<[That sounds bad, but I guess I’m missing your point. The way she tells it isn’t exactly flattering to her. She feels guilty as hell about it, and she really considers it like having tried to kill you. She hates that she did it.]>
<[She should,]> I said. <[Do have any idea what it’s like to feel your own body just stop listening to you? To be completely helpless at the hands of someone you trusted? She could have stopped the nerves in my heart with a thought. She could have made me snap a fucking nazi salute and would have been able to do nothing. I had my fair share of nightmares before meeting Nora, and I still wake up in a cold sweat every other night with my heart pounding. But ever since she hijacked me, when I wake up, nightmares or not? I still feel that twisting and crawling deep in my own arms. After I wake up, I have to spend a few seconds moving them slowly to remind myself that I’m the one who gets to be in control of me.]>
<[…I don’t know exactly what to say to that. I…wanted to be hard on her when she came back that upset with herself, because I knew she wouldn’t be that hard on herself if it weren’t something bad. I don’t think I’m objective though, because I’ve got the impulse to defend her anyway. She did it because—]>
<[I know why she did it,]> I snapped. <[Better than you, I’d wager.]>
<[I’m just saying she had a good reason for—]>
<[She rap-ped him,]> Michelle interrupted.
How’d she even sense this line?
<[No, she didn’t,]> I huffed.
<[No. She didn-n’t,]> Michelle agreed. <[B-but it’s the sam-me concept-pt, Car. P-power. Con-ntrol. Having a good reason-n doesn-n’t m-make it b-better. It m-makes it worse.]>
Caroline didn’t have response to that.
<[Tell Nora, yes, I’m still very, very upset with her,]> I decided. <[She did not rape me, metaphorically or otherwise. But what she did was a violation. Of trust and a whole lot more.]>
<[…Sorry. I like her. It bothers me that she did something like that…but…I still like her. I still respect her. I can’t not after everything she’s done,]> Caroline said.
<[I shouldn’t have gotten so heated,]> I conceded. <[Trouble is, I still like her too. I still respect her too. And sometimes people who you like and respect hurt you. And when they have good, actually good reasons for hurting you? I don’t know what in the world I’m supposed to do about that.]>
Caroline nodded solemnly. The rest of our group still walking through the Beacon station’s halls oblivious to our spat.
<[…How’d you even hear us, Michelle?]> I asked.
That they both visibly reacted to.
<[She needs your help,]> Caroline said.