Threader (10 page)

Hesitant, I reach out to place my hands in his and my skin feels freezing against his warmth.

‘Once you've threaded successfully with me, we should be able to enter the processing unit from here,' he says. ‘When we're inside, I need you to just focus on keeping the thread secure and for you to stay calm. If you start to panic inside the data grid, we'll crash and I can assure you, that's kind of uncomfortable.'

‘Your mother was one of the pioneers of long-distance threading techniques,' Wendell says. ‘And your brain scans have indicated an almost perfect alignment to hers, so this should be simple for you.'

‘Did you know my mother?' The question spills from my lips and I pull away from Aaron in surprise.

‘I'm familiar with her research.' Wendell looks like she regrets mentioning it. ‘I understand you don't know much about her time here. I'm afraid there's not much else I can tell you.'

‘Josie?' Aaron lifts his hands, waiting.

Feeling disappointed at the lack of information, I slip my hands into his as Wendell leaves the room. I look back at Aaron. His eyes are a pale auburn colour with flecks of gold and he stares at me in a way that makes me uncomfortable.

‘Whenever you're ready.' Wendell appears in the viewing room, her voice echoing around us. I cast doubtful eyes towards the computer.

‘Try to remember how it happened with Blake,' Aaron says.

‘I don't remember,' I tell him. ‘I kind of panicked.'

He squeezes my hands and smiles. ‘Instincts can work just as well. Just relax.'

Taking a deep breath, I allow both my talents to spread out and inch towards Aaron.

‘Have you started?' Aaron asks. ‘I can't tell.'

‘Sort of,' I tell him.

‘You can do it,' he says. ‘Just take it slow.'

His gentle words make my talents brave and they swoop into his mind. As if following a familiar path, they follow his mind's busy network, until they come to what I saw inside Blake: a blazing sun at his centre. Understanding now that this is the central point of a talent, I allow my own talents to weave around it. An electric feeling fires through me as I do, dancing along my skin, and something inside me shifts by a small degree. For a moment, I'm elated, realising I just completed my first official thread. At least, the first one on purpose. Then a sluggish sensation engulfs my talents and the braid unravels. My talents whip about, confused.

‘What's wrong?' Aaron asks softly. ‘I think I can feel you now, but something feels … wrong.'

‘I don't know.' Panic grips me and my sight blurs. My talents feel heavy and difficult to control. With a burst of concentration, I pull them out and the effort washes my vision white. A stabbing pain skewers my head and my talents recoil home. Aaron is sent reeling back in his chair with a surprised shout and I double over, gasping for breath. A moment later, Wendell's shoes swim into my vision.

‘What happened?' She crouches down, lifting my head gently. A bright light shines in each of my eyes.

‘I don't know,' I say, sucking in a big breath.

Wendell gets to her feet and I hear her talking to Aaron. Black dots dance around the corners of my vision. After a few minutes, my breath returns to normal and I straighten in the chair, sweat trickling down the nape of my neck.

Aaron crouches beside me. ‘Do you need to lie down?'

I notice one of his eyes is bloodshot and a small tear of blood leaks from the corner.

My throat convulses as I swallow a wave of nausea. ‘Please don't tell me I did that.'

He swipes at the tear with a shrug. ‘Don't worry about it. I was half ready for it.'

‘I don't know what happened,' I tell him.

‘We'll figure it out,' Wendell says. ‘It's probably just nerves.'

‘I'm not sure that was the problem.' Aaron's hand drops from me. When I look up at him, I see him staring at me with a thoughtful expression. ‘It felt like something was interfering with the thread.'

‘What would cause that?' I ask.

‘Let's take a break for lunch,' Wendell announces. ‘I'll examine the results of today's tests. Maybe I can pinpoint what went wrong.' She glances at Aaron. ‘And you'd better report to medical to get checked out, make sure no real damage was done.'

By the end of the day, I'm flat-out exhausted and after a lunch of spinach salad with sunflower seeds between tests, I'm starving for dinner. When I trudge back to the waiting room, I'm surprised to find Cora waiting. It occurs to me the female slider doesn't have many friends, but I'm more than grateful for her company as we head to the canteen.

Once there, we load our trays with food and find seats at the back, surrounded by a general bustling of people eating and talking. The food selection isn't bad; I've chosen pasta and parsnip fries with a cola, while Cora has an anaemic looking tuna salad and a bottle of sparkling water.

‘How did it go with Wendell?' she asks.

‘Some of it went okay.' I'm hungry, but anxiety pinches my stomach and I can barely touch the food in front of me. ‘Some of it didn't.'

‘Just nerves, I bet,' Cora chuckles. ‘You'll be fine.'

‘Here she is.'

I look up to see Archer and Cooper approach us with loaded trays. They sit next to us and Cora's face flushes when Cooper throws her a dazzling smile.

‘How did your first day go?' Archer asks me. ‘When are you joining general population?'

‘I start tomorrow.' I look at Cora for confirmation, but she's busy studying her salad. ‘I think.'

A tall Indian guy with coal-black hair approaches our table, clutching a tray piled with food. He's skinny, with pants that are hitched too high and ears that are too big.

‘H-hey, Cora,' he stammers.

Archer looks at him with a frown. ‘Beat it, techno-nerd.'

The skinny guy's face falls and he hurries off and settles down at an empty table before Cora or I can say anything. She throws me a stricken look while Archer and Cooper just chat among themselves like nothing happened. I heave a sigh and stand, knowing I'm probably about to commit social suicide. Somehow, this feels like high school all over again.

‘Come on, Cora.' I pick up my tray. ‘Let's go.'

‘Don't leave,' Archer protests. ‘Come on. If you want to sit with the dork, we don't mind. I'll call him back.'

‘Don't do me any favours,' I say, then cross the room to the Indian guy, who's staring at me like I've grown a second head.

‘Are you crazy?' he hisses when I sit down. Cora joins us a second later and she's breathing kind of fast. The conversation in the room dips and I realise people are watching us.

‘That was unexpected.' Cora puts her tray down. ‘Josie, this is my friend, Darsh. Darsh, meet Josie.'

‘You do realise that was your big chance to join the elite group,' Darsh tells me.

I shrug. ‘What does it matter?'

Cora gives me a funny look. ‘Like I was telling you before, Galloway Industries only offers limited positions to graduating cadets. A lot of it comes down to politics, families and who you know. Cooper and Archer both have corporate capital. Archer's dad is a high ranking judge and Cooper's heir to some pharmaceutical empire. You can be pretty sure that come graduation, they'll be offered positions with Galloway Industries. They'd be good friends to have.'

‘And you just blew it with them,' Darsh points out helpfully.

‘Josie's not like them,' Cora tells him, then turns to me. ‘But he's right, you know. Life would be pretty easy inside their group. Most of them have been at the academy since primary school, so they think they run the place.'

‘Screw the elite,' I mutter. Sure, Cora and Darsh couldn't do anything for me socially, but sitting here just felt like the right thing to do. I guess I'm lucky Helios isn't interested in me for my street smarts. ‘Doing things the easy way has never been an option for me, why start now.' I offer up a winning smile to Darsh. ‘So, what's your talent?'

‘He's a technopath.' Cora jumps in before Darsh can say anything. ‘A really good one.'

‘And all the ladies love me for it.' Darsh pretends to adjust some imaginary cuffs. ‘I used to work at my family manufacturing plant in Bangalore, before I was offered a place at Helios.'

‘Cool,' I say, then add awkwardly, ‘well, I'm a threader.'

‘Oh yeah?' Darsh looks more impressed than he should be. ‘How good are you?'

‘She only went to Assessment today,' Cora says. ‘Give her a break.'

‘What kind of tests did they want you to do?' he asks, shovelling some pasta into his mouth.

‘I met Aaron Galloway,' I say. ‘And they wanted me to do stuff with him.'

Darsh pauses between mouthfuls, his eyes darting to Cora. ‘That sounded creepy to you as well, right?'

‘It didn't go so well. I may have broken his brain.' An idea forms in my head. ‘How good a technopath are you?' I ask Darsh. ‘Are you as good as Aaron Galloway is supposed to be?'

Darsh swallows before answering. ‘Uh … no. He's kind of the best there is.'

Cora's eyes dart behind me. ‘Don't look now, but Olivia Galloway just walked in.'

‘Who?' I turn to see a long-legged redhead stride into the canteen. Her clothes have the Helios logo, but I haven't seen anyone else wear what she's got. She's in leggings and knee-high boots, with a wide belt and fitted top. A thin girl with blonde hair trots behind her, dressed in a pencil skirt and an identical top.

‘Olivia is the youngest in the Galloway family,' Cora tells me. ‘She's the redhead and a first year cadet, like us. Only a low-level TP esper. Nothing too flash. Tina is the blonde. I don't know what she does, other than being Olivia's doormat.' Cora pauses. ‘This should be interesting.'

‘Why?' I watch Olivia march towards Archer and Cooper. Other cadets have sat at their table now, and I recognise Dutch and Jasmine with them, talking and laughing among themselves. Nobody notices Olivia until she stops behind Archer.

‘Apparently, Archer and Olivia were an item nearly all through secondary school,' Cora explains, ‘then he broke up with her a month ago. The rumour is, Archer was fooling around behind her back and she had no idea until Tina told her. Pretty sure that's the first time someone tried to make a Galloway look stupid.'

I glance back over my shoulder just in time to see Olivia say something to Archer. He doesn't acknowledge her presence, but says something to Cooper, who breaks up in gales of laughter. Olivia's back stiffens. Her head whips around, realising people are watching her. Anger ripples across her face, then smooths to nothing.

‘Awkward,' Darsh mutters.

Olivia might come from a powerful family, but I can't help but feel a little sorry for her. It's obvious Archer doesn't care that he's humiliating a fancy-pants Galloway family member. But instead of fireworks, Olivia turns and stalks off. Her friend Tina follows, throwing Archer a dirty look over her shoulder.

‘I wouldn't like to be in Archer's shoes.' Darsh tugs absently at one of his ears. ‘You don't screw around with the Galloways, without it coming back to bite you.'

Turning away from Olivia, my eyes snag on a figure. Blake sits at a table by himself at the back of the room. He's watching his sister leave, his brow furrowed. As if sensing me, his gaze zeros in on mine. I glance down quickly, busy myself with poking my congealing pasta.

‘What?' Cora catches my expression and looks around before spying Blake. ‘I wonder why he's in here,' she says. ‘He usually has lunch outside, by himself, nose stuffed in a dusty paper book or something. I mean, I love retro as much as the next person, but honestly. What a pretentious jerk. I mean, he shouldn't even be eating in here, this is for cadets, not faculty.'

‘Maybe he doesn't feel he fits in with them,' I say absently, then wonder where that thought came from. ‘What does he read?' I ask, remembering the books he bought from Bobby.

‘Who cares?' Cora says. ‘I hate it when he takes the slider tutorials. I'm not very good and he makes me so nervous.'

‘I'm sure you're not that bad,' I say.

Cora snorts. ‘I don't slide fast enough, so I can't travel very far and he's really mean about it.'

‘Shadow sliding sounds like a pretty amazing skill,' I say.

‘I guess.' Cora doesn't sound convinced. ‘I hate it though. You always need deep shadow to step into the slipstream. I don't relish the idea of living half my life bumbling around in the dark.' Her eyebrows rise. ‘Do you remember much about your slide with Blake?'

‘How do you know about that?' I ask, frowning. Was it public knowledge how I'd arrived at Helios? I wasn't sure I liked that.

Cora flushes. ‘I might have taken a little peek of your file and read what happened with him.'

I shrug, sipping my cola. ‘I had no idea what I'd done, or where I was. I felt like I was falling … or maybe drowning in ice water.'

‘I heard the slipstream once described like a fast flowing river,' Darsh says.

‘Kind of,' Cora replies. ‘The slipstream is the layer before the shadow biosphere itself. Sliders only skim across the surface of that fast flowing river. Of course, there are these currents you can ride safely and they're always marked and mapped by beacons. It's their light that form the tunnels we use inside the slipstream.'

Listening to Cora describe the frightening dimension I'd slipped into with Blake, I can't help but steal another glance at him. He's still alone at the table, and I find myself wondering if he has any friends at the academy, or even a girlfriend.

‘We call these tunnels lightpaths, and usually enter them through safe entryways, accessed through slider dark-rooms,' Cora continues her explanation. ‘But if you get tossed off a path, you land deeper in the slipstream and then you can get in serious trouble. It's difficult to get back on track unless you're wearing a nanosuit and have some serious thruster juice loaded in. Not to mention you'd need plenty of oxygen packs, or you'd suffocate from the thin atmosphere.'