She rose to her elbows and put the tablet back on his chest. “Ruari O’Duinn Sheehan. Okay. Let’s see what we see.”

A few seconds later she spoke, her voice stiffer than before. “Someone huge covered this up, Rory. Give me a moment.”

More time passed before she spoke again. “Alright, here we go. Ruari O’Duinn Sheehan. Awakened on September 28, 3244, just days after turning ten. You barely made it, huh? Let’s see… You awakened at lev-”

She froze still. Rory could barely tell she was breathing.

Neither said anything for almost a full minute until she asked, “Is this real?” He nodded. “Do you have any idea what this means? I don’t know if anyone even thought it was possible to awaken at a level 8.”

“Keep reading.”

“There’s more?”

He nodded.

“Okay. Awakened at a level 8. Ice element. I knew that. Why did you ask?”

“What if I told you that it was only partially correct?”

“What? You don’t have ice?”

“No, I do.”

“Then what do you-” She cut herself off again.

Rory looked up and saw her eyes moving as she thought.

“A second element?”

Rory nodded.

She thought longer and he could see her making the connections as her eyes widened. This one was of the reasons he liked her so much. She was so damn clever.

“One that the machine didn’t identify,” she postulated. It wasn’t a question but Rory nodded anyway. “A death basilisk.” Rory nodded again. “No…” It was almost a hiss. He slowly nodded yet again, not taking his eyes off hers.

Her hand was covering her mouth which was open in shock. She sat up, her legs under her; after which Rory rose to his elbows and watched her. She looked down at him and spoke slowly. “Rory. Are you saying you awakened at level 8, which is unique as far as records go back, have dual elements, which happens about once a generation per planet, with the first being one of the rarest advanced elements of ice and the other a possibly unique element, death?”

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He nodded.

It was obvious to him by her faraway look that she had started processing quite a bit of information quickly. While she did that, he sat up and took his shirt off, tossing it aside. Then he returned to his previous position.

She had been in her own mind, thinking but finally spoke.

“Someone blocked it. The Walshes? They have the money, clout, and attitude to cover something like that up. Something that shocking, would have been big news. I can’t imagine how many they silenced, one way or another, and how much they spent to do it. They’d have to have hidden it from the Crown too, and quickly, since you would have almost certainly been invited to the Palace.”

He nodded.

Finally, she noticed he was shirtless and looked confused. As always, her eyes went to his inscriptions, what she thought were body art. Then she really studied them. Her eyes jumped back to Rory’s face. Then back to his inscriptions and back to his face. He smiled sadly and nodded.

Her eyes watered and her hand was back over her mouth.

“Those aren’t art, are they?”

Rory shook his head.

“Oh, Rory. You were only ten.”

He nodded.

“You ran?”

She was so amazingly brilliant. The more time he spent with her, the more he found he couldn’t get enough of her.

“More or less,” he answered. “It’s more complicated, but basically accurate.”

Steph was thoughtful for another minute or two until speaking again. “And you ended up here, in the slums, because they took everything except what it cost you to get here, and you’ve been hiding from them this whole time. And your mother couldn’t…”

“Again, it’s a little more complicated. I’m still holding a few things back. But that is the summary of it, yes.”

Steph crawled over to him and hugged him tightly. He wrapped his arms around her too, but carefully.

“I’m so sorry, Rory,” she said into his chest. He could feel himself getting wet from her tears.

He said softly as he ran his hand along her silky hair, “I’m better now. I’m a warrior and I’m growing stronger. Thanks to your company, I have enough money to get by and invest in my growth and save my mum. In a bunch of years, I’ll be strong enough to survive the Walshes’ attention and I’ll expose myself. But for now, I’m staying on a nowhere planet, away from their eyes, doing what I can do solo. The armor will help, I hope.”

She nodded into his chest. They lay like that for a few minutes when Steph lifted her head up and wiped her face. She looked at him and spoke in a tone of discovery.

“Your compatibility is almost certainly part of the reason your body’s changing so quickly but not killing you. Along with everything else I said before, too.”

Rory shrugged. The reason did not matter to him, as long it worked. “If you say so. I trust your judgment."

Smiling sadly, she leaned forward, kissed him softly, and then lay on his chest again.

“Oh!” and he poked her, trying to raise the mood. “I put an SV into blade sharpness by the way. Aren’t you proud of me?”

She sniffled and laughed. “Good for you. And yes, I am.” Then she looked at his bare chest and said in an interested tone, “In fact, I think you deserve a reward.”

Rory’s eyebrows rose as he put his hands behind his head and asked, “Oh? What kind?”

She grinned, climbed on him and kissed his mouth. Then she kissed his chest. And then she kissed more things.