Page 4 of Exiles on Earth
His gaze flickers, struggling to stay on mine.
My voice lowers, as steady and calm as I want him to be. “Forget the instruments. You’re not in the cockpit right now, but you’re still here. You’re orientated.”
He swallows hard, his hand twitching up above us as if reaching for non-existent instruments.
“Focus on what you can control,” I tell him. “Your breathing. In, out. That’s something no one can take from you.” I glance toward the locked door, as if we’re still on Oloria. “You’re still a pilot, the best navigator clone I've ever seen. You can do this.”
“I can’t. I don’t have access to the data, I need… I need everything!”
“We’re not that far away from the planet yet?—”
“Approximately two point seven clicks.” Sweat tracks down his temples. “Given our apparent velocity on exit calculated from our mass which I estimated, and time since taking off which I’ve been counting, we’re two point seven clicks away. But…” His face creases with grief. “There’s too many estimations, so much room for error! I could be as much as twenty two percent off on our current location.”
I hold his gaze, steady and unyielding, the way a commander should. “Arture, focus on me. We’ll get through this. Look at me—not the walls, not the floor, just me.”
He hesitates, his breaths shallow and rapid, but his eyes stay on mine. A good start.
“You don’t need instruments to know where we are,” I orderhim. “You’re a Pranastock. Feel how the shuttle moves, the vibrations. Tell me where we are, Arture. You can do this.”
His lips part, but no words come out. Doubt flickers in his expression, the panic threatening to drag him under.
I lean against his arm and push harder. “You’ve flown in worse conditions than this, and you’ve charted courses blind before. Remember when the nav systems failed on Zegora? You didn’t need screens to understand where we were, and you’ve got this in you now.”
He swallows hard, his trembling fingers clenching into fists. His shoulders relax a fraction, and he closes his eyes, tilting his head slightly.
“I… I can sense the magnetic pull of the planet,” Nevare offers.
I glance up at the Parthiastock Apex.
His gray eyes focus on me, a rarity. “We’re… drifting on a slow arc.”
“Yes, we are,” Arture agrees, wiping his brow on his shoulder, scales clicking as they brush past one another. He’s not completely reassured, and won’t be until he can calibrate off instruments and absorb some data, but he’s better than he was.
I scan the rest of their faces, bracing for the next crisis. The others are utterly still, all looking to me for guidance. Our clone types control our preferences and purposes. I’m supposed to be a leader and adventurer, developed to be intelligent and to push through challenges, all perfect qualities for leading an exploration.
But beyond my function, I care for their wellbeing deeply. I’d give my life for any one of them.
“What happened, Ilia?” Gara asks quietly.
Resting my back against the cold wall, I prepare to put my suspicions into words. I’ve only ever told the truth to them, even in the most dire of situations. “I—I suspect it’s related to my registration in the Mating Games somehow.”
Dom tugs the manacle around his thick wrist. Sweaty brown hair clings to his strong jaw. “That’s not illegal. The Prif was determined to remove us. Why is that?”
“What does it matter now, anyway?” Gara grumbles.
“It doesn’t, I suppose, except knowing who to throw hate at.” Arik glances up at me.
I lift my chin. “I never intended for this to happen. If I knew it could, I would never have entered the Games with you as my crew. I’d let you go, and do it alone. You…you would be within your rights to reject me as leader. All I ask is I set you up safely wherever we're dropped off before you?—”
“Enough of that,” Gara says.
“We won’t do anything of the sort,” Dom agrees, purple scales hardening.
“Besides, we need you to figure out what we are going to do planet-side,” Arik says, voice light.
Gara stretches out his legs as far as he can, interlocking them in between Dom’s. “And you'd better not be thinking about shooting yourself so we’ll eat you in order to survive.”
“Drok na,” Dom swears. Nevare goes yellow with nausea.
