"Ya think?" Tiff said with a hard eye roll.
Clara gave Tiff a steady look and she blushed, the color washing up to her face in a dull brick color. Sophie grinned. No one ever saw Tiff embarrassed, priceless.
Daniel smiled at Clara as Matthew approached the group, the boys shifting nervously as he got closer, his sheer physical size was pretty alarming up close.
"Ya know, Caleb," Jonesy said in a nervous voice, "I'm thinkin' you better get elaborating. Speedy-like." He looked at the Band, all of them spreading out and encircling us.
Daniel watched the young Travelers with some amusement, little more than children. "Let me assist in this Clara."
Daniel faced the one that was the puppeteer for the dead, his dark hair and eyes sitting in a face of keen intelligence. Daniel's eyes swept the young man's body, he was well-knit as well, not soft.
Perhaps he had known battle? He had that hard edge.
"I am Daniel. Why are you here this day?"
"Hi, I'm Caleb Hart. We've come to repair the damage to the sphere."
Daniel's brows knit together.
He turned to Clara and raised his voice for all the Band to hear, "This one says that he and his comrades shall arrest the progression of damage caused by the pellets of salt."
The Band nodded but the one whose eyes never left me asked, "Aye... so easily? The Master over the Dead seeks to reverse damage to a most modern and complicated structure," Matthew scoffed, "I presume not."
"Okay, so I guess we need to convince these guys." I turned to John. "Can't you like, run interference or some crap? We need to get this party started."
"Well... I did take a medieval speech course last summer," John said with hesitation. "But... it may be too ancient for the speech they use."
"No shit Terran?" Bry said.
John sighed. "Yeah, could you keep the swearing to a minimum? I'm not sure what's offensive to these people."
"Yeah moron, do an Ali, Nazi-out on their asses."
The Band frowned and moved closer to Jonesy. "Kidding... kidding, big Dudes." He raised his palms in supplication and laughed nervously, gulping.
"Jonesy, shut up," Randi said, the men of the Band looking at her with curiosity. She, Sophie and Jonesy were getting the most scrutiny.
"What do they say, Daniel?" another male of the Band asked.
"I am not entirely certain, I think they're bickering amongst themselves." Daniel shrugged.
"They be infantile then?" one of the males asked without rancor.
A tall male with hair the same color as the Queen nodded, maybe around our age and a younger girl with blonde hair said, "Are they nary our years?"
"It appears as such, yet they act as if they are but ten years."
"Hey!" Jonesy said, forgetting his promise to shut his trap. "I think I'm getting that!"
"They're saying we're babies or something," Tiff said, insulted.
John lifted his palm. "Shut up, all of you."
John turned to Queen Clara, taking a deep breath. He let it out slowly then began, thinking that his medieval speech course was probably too ancient for their speech. He went for it anyway. "We come in peace this day. To offer a solution that may rectify the degradation of your sphere, restore it wholly and halt the further progression of the salt compromise."
He looked expectantly at the Queen of Ohio and she turned that radiant smile on him, the strobe of it hitting John between the eyes. He thought he might be in love.
That was until Tiff snapped her fingers in front of his face. "Shake it off, Terran."
I smirked as I watched John fall under the charisma that was the Queen while Matthew frowned. John flicked his eyes to the huge man, weapons hanging off him head to toe.
Clara answered, "That would be most helpful, Traveler." Then she hesitated, "There be another pair of Travelers who... took a piece of my flesh, we do not know why..."
Sophie gasped, forgetting caution and rushed to Clara. She grabbed the forearm that Clara had offered for perusal and turned it over, a star-shaped scar lay there and Sophie ran a finger over it. She slowly looked at Clara, who openly stared at Sophie's unusual coloring and manner.
"What is it Soph?" Jonesy asked.
"She has the same scar that creeper did!"
"Which creeper?" I asked. Hell there were too many for me to keep track of.
"The AP attacker."
Of course!
"That would mean he was from here," John said slowly, thinking about everything that tied that together.
"Yeah, he was a helluva lot more than AP."
John turned to Clara, her arm still within the hold of Sophie's hand, the polished ivory of it directly contrasting with the light coffee of Sophie's skin and asked, "What do you name the group who wander about?" John asked, throwing his palm out to encompass the greater Outside.
"The fragment," one said in a flat voice, a warrior woman stood beside him, leaning against another for support.
John got excited, punching his fist into his open palm and the Band tensed. He tried to rein it in with effort. "Okay, so these fragment guys, some are criminals from our world. What's to say when the Graysheets need a disposable assassin they don't just use one of the fragment? They bite the big one in our world, then they remain unidentified forever?" He threw his hands up like... duh.
I looked at the beat up warrior princess that stood next to a dude with old-fashioned mail on. She had gills too, flaring slightly as she breathed.
Surreal.
Sophie dropped Clara's arm and smiled at her.
"John, tell her what the plan is," I said.
John smiled nervously, his lips pulling away from his teeth in the parody of a grimace. I narrowed my eyes on my best friend. "You do have a plan, wise ass?"
John said, "It's more of a theory."
"Well get hot, the natives are restless," I said, using another Gramps-ism.
John nodded. "Right." He turned to Jonesy. "You ready?"
"Hell yeah, born ready, Terran! Bring it!" Jonesy extolled, his dark face lighting up with typical enthusiasm.
"Wait!" Clara said with a ringing command. John turned toward her and she phrased her next question carefully, years of royal diplomacy coming to her aid, "Be most careful, young Traveler. For it is the only home my people have ever known."
John swallowed. Damn, no pressure.
He turned to Jonesy. "Come on Jones."
"Yes, sir," he said, cocking his hand in a mock-salute.
The Js and I walked a short ways along the perimeter of the sphere, noting the door Archer had unlocked and Alex had opened.
"Wow, look at the degradation just since we've been here last," John said, pushing against the sphere side, his handprint as he pulled away filling in again.
"How long would it have been before it was...?" Alex asked, walking up behind us, keeping one eye on the dudes with gills.
"Gone?" John filled in.
When Alex nodded John said, "Maybe a month. That's how long a pulse-cycle would've taken, so I'm guessing that."
"Is it beyond repair?" I asked, eying up the one meter diameter holes peppering the surface.
John shrugged. "All we can do is attempt a fix."
"Alex?" John called.
"Yes?"
"You have the salt?"
He nodded, taking a bag made of leather. They hadn't known what would travel. The last time, the chick's jewelry had all been lost.
I hadn't wanted to dwell too much on where that'd gone off to.
Troubling thought process, that.
Alex reached inside the bag and everything suddenly happened at once.
Clara screamed in a startled voice, "Matthew, they possess salt!"
And then the big dude with eyes so blue they didn't look real had his hand wrapped on Alex's wrist.
I could feel violence contained, the very air trembled with it. Jade grabbed onto the back of my hoodie, feeling the tension in the atmosphere, her Empath skills triggered and on full alert.
Matthew's face showed instant surprise, as did Alex's. He tried to wrench his arm free and Matthew grunted in restraint.
"Holy shit, they're as strong as Alex!" Jonesy said.
Totally not the larger point, I thought. Like, hoping we didn't get our asses kicked would be the primary objective.
Matthew turned to the others of the Band, "He is Band."
Alex let his hand drop, "What?"
Daniel's brows rose to his hairline. "You feel kinship recognition?"
"Aye," Matthew nodded, studying Alex. Finally, after much scrutiny he grinned. It was so shocking on his stern face the group all responded with instant smiles.
"What's Band?" Alex asked.
"They are the enforcers," Daniel replied in explanation.
"Of what?" Jade asked from behind me, walking around me until she could see Alex and the huge dude of the Band, Matthew.
Daniel gave her a curious look. "The protection of females... and everything else."
"Why the girls?" Sophie asked and John rolled his eyes. I was certain he wanted to get the sphere nailed then be on our way. Each moment we spent here supposedly made it worse for the people here. That was the Theory of John anyway.
Daniel continued, "There are very few."
John got curious despite his rush. "What is the ratio?"
Daniel frowned. John thought of another way to phrase it. "What be the count of males as compared to females?"
Daniel had been raised fragment and they dealt very much in numbers. Thievery and trading wares made their prowess for math legendary. Daniel fashioned his answer so his group would also understand, "There be fifteen males for every one that is female."
The girls sucked in their breath.
I frowned, no wonder it was so screwed up here.
John explained, "We must use the salt which began the ruination of your sphere and combine it with the advances of my world to halt its destruction."
Clara understood. "I do apologize... however, I surmised you may be..."
John held up his palm. "It is fine. I do understand the trepidation over the same ingredient being used for repair that was the cause of the sphere's demise."
"You go, Terran!" Jonesy fist-pumped and John blushed a fine, clear red.
"Can it, dumbass," Tiff said. "He's getting' his mojo on." She gave a big grin to John and he gave a small smile back, pleased.
Clara nodded as the Band studied Alex, who returned their stares with equal regard.
John grabbed the salt, and sprinkled a large portion over roughly a half meter area. Jonesy stepped forward and John nodded. Before Jonesy put his palm on the patch of salt that lay hissing where it made contact with the sphere wall, John said, "Don't be stupid, Jonesy. This matters."
"Yeah, yeah, Terran, keep your boxers on. I got this."
And with that, Jonesy laid his palm on the sizzling area. Instantly the spot began to glow and Jonesy straightened where he stood, his face going from his typical nonchalant expression to a shrieking intensity. The Band clustered around, watching the boy with skin so brown it was almost black, prove out a different kind of magic entirely.
Clara watched as light like the bolts of lightning she remembered watching as a child from the safety of her chamber, wound their way like wily snakes, branching away from his dark hand. They formed a grid-like pattern that carried them like tendrils of perfect, symmetric brilliance to the offending holes, closing them in as water poured in a cup. They throbbed and contracted, the light pouring into the holes, which were once dim, now became solidly opaque, gradually deepening.
After minutes that became long enough so twilight stole around them, Jonesy lifted his hand off the sphere wall. He turned to Clara and smiled, she gasped at how white his teeth were in the impending gloom. It was startling.
"You can tell me," Jonesy said, hand to his chest, ready to bow.
Tiff rolled her eyes but I said it, he'd done okay. "You're the greatest, Jones."
"Yeah, I got that," Jonesy said with snark, but his face was tired and his body looked strained and wrung out.
It's not every day that you light up a whole world.
We looked at the sphere, lit with a soft glow, whole again. The scars from the salt punishment were pinkish, but already moving toward the original milky incandescence of the sections that weren't compromised .
My friends were all grinning at the remarkable structure, us for different reasons than the people of Clara's world.
Jonesy said, "It can't be all bad... our abilities."
I thought about it. "Yeah, but the reason behind them sucked."