The Travels of Scout Shannon: Books 4-6

Chapter 16

16

It wasn’t his ship, but Bo seemed to know every centimeter of it anyway. He led Scout down the length of the marketplace to where it ended in a wide staircase with shallow steps spaced so far apart it was almost not even a staircase. The dogs trotted along beside her, occasionally smelling the air. Then they started to pull at the leashes, trying to urge her on faster.

“Where are we going?” Scout asked as she fought to keep a firm hold on their leashes.

“The park,” Bo said, sounding surprised. “Did no one show it to you?”

“No,” Scout said. Her tour of the ship had been a pretty abbreviated affair, limited to the places Sparrow liked best.

“It’s perfect for dogs,” Bo said.

“I guess so,” Scout said as the dogs whined, anxious to move up the seemingly endless staircase just a little faster.

“You can let them go. Nothing will befall them,” he said.

“I’m more worried about what they might do,” Scout said.

“They’ll be fine,” Bo promised. “Consider it my first demonstration that I’m worthy of trust.”

Scout gave him a hard look but decided he was probably right. The dogs could look out for themselves, and if Gert ended up mauling another cat, it would be on his head.

She bent to untie the cords from the collars, Gert first because she was generally calmer about it, but even she was jumping again and again, anxious to be free. At last, the knot slipped off her collar, and she turned to charge up the stairs.

“Hey, wait for your brother!” Scout called after her. Shadow whined pitifully but sat at rigid attention until she had the cord untied and he could make his way more slowly after Gert.

“See, he knows how much he can handle,” Bo said. “He’ll be back up to speed by this evening, I’m sure.”

Scout wrapped the cords up into tight coils and slipped them into one of the many pouches on her belt.

“That was Gertrude Bauer’s belt, wasn’t it?” Bo asked.

“Yes,” Scout said with what she hoped was a tone that would encourage him to drop the matter, but she should have known better.

“I saw her cross the barricade,” Bo admitted as they slowly continued their climb up the stairs. Scout could see a bright light at the top of the stairs that had the warm yellow feel of real sunlight. “That was a bit surprising, a galactic marshal breaking a barricade like that. I did a little research and learned why she was there. Tragic story.”

“Tragic ending,” Scout said.

“I would have preferred she got her man, to be honest,” Bo said, “but at least her man was got. And good riddance.”

“She shouldn’t have died,” Scout said. “Do you know the details about that?”

“Just that she was there with you in that bunker,” Bo said. “I won’t ask you to tell that story. Nothing that involves eight of you going in but only you coming out can be a fun tale to tell.”

“No,” Scout said. She tried looking up again, even shading her eyes with her hand, but all she saw was the dazzle of sunlight.

“The governor still doesn’t know the fate of his daughter and her ward,” Bo said. “What do you think, Scout? Should I tell him where to find her? Knowing that in finding her he will surely discover she was planning to betray him?”

“She hadn’t decided that yet,” Scout said.

“She took a lot of steps in that direction,” Bo said.

“Stop offering me decisions that affect other people’s lives,” Scout said. “I don’t want that responsibility. You decide what’s best, since you know so much already.”

“Fair enough,” Bo said, tuning out the growing anger in her voice. Then he inhaled, filling his lungs deeply. “Stars, I love that smell.”

Scout gave him a puzzled look but then smelled the air herself. It had a rich green aroma. The closest she could compare it to was the prairie after the rains came, when everything started to bloom, but it was far beyond that.

And she could hear birds chirping. Hundreds of birds, all cheeping and whistling and singing at once.

Then they were on the top step, and Scout stepped through an arching gateway to a space easily as large as the engineering room below, but where that place had been eerie and dark, this was filled with sunlight. The entire ceiling was lost to it.

A path started at the top of the stairs, and past the archway machined out of the metal of the ship was a second archway, this one of living trees. The trunks bent inward ever so slightly, and their branches extended over the path, tangling together over Scout’s head.

On Amatheon, the only trees Scout had seen were the stunted, wind-twisted varieties that clung to rock faces in the mountains. That and her brief glimpse the day before as Emilie flew them over the forested continent.

Shadow and Gert came charging down the path, delighted that she had joined them. Gert collided with Scout, her heavy paws knocking Scout back a step as the dog jumped up on her. Then something skittered in the undergrowth, and both dogs pursued it, tails wagging madly.

“See? The perfect place for dogs,” Bo said.

“You were right,” Scout said.

“I’ve often thought of getting a dog,” Bo said. “Just a small one, one I can take with me on my travels.”

“If your ship is anything like this one, I don’t know why it’d have to be a small dog.”

“My ship is somewhat smaller,” Bo said. “But sometimes I travel in a little one-seater, just on my own. I would need a dog about the size of your little one if I wanted to take him with me in that.”

“Shadow,” Scout said. “And the big one is Gert.”

“Gert,” Bo said, raising an eyebrow.

“For Gertrude,” Scout said.

“That’s a fine way to honor her memory,” Bo said.

Scout just shrugged. She really didn’t want to talk with him about Gertrude.

“I have a menagerie back home in galactic central,” Bo said. “I’d love to show it to you when we get there. Even if you arrive with the Months. I don’t hold grudges.”

“What’s a menagerie?” Scout asked.

“A collection of animals,” Bo said. If he had noticed the pinkening of her cheeks she had felt at having to ask, he gave no sign. “I collect animals from all over the galaxy, and I have a team of zoologists who set up their living spaces and supervise their diets. I like to keep my animals happy.”

“What kind of animals?” Scout asked.

“I have five sections to my menagerie,” he said as they strolled out from under the trees to an open space covered in green grass. Some of the stalks were turning to seed on top, and an occasional flower danced among the blades, but this was a very different sort of grassland than the red-gold, monster stalks of grain she was used to back home. “The first is my aquatic world. Most of it is saltwater creatures, but I have a separate tank for freshwater creatures and even an artificial river.”

“Must be big,” Scout said, only half listening as she looked back down the path for her dogs. There was a rustle of ferny plants, and then they emerged. Thankfully, neither of them had a little animal in their mouth.

“Next is the polar area,” Bo went on. “Some people think the cold environments don’t harbor much life, but they couldn’t be more wrong.”

“Ah,” Scout said. She wasn’t sure what the correct response was. She knew nothing about the animals of other planets. She knew a little about the animals from Old Earth from her school days, but that was it.

“Then I have a tropical environment,” he went on. “That’s always the first place I visit after a long trip in space. I’m always so cold every minute when I’m traveling. The tropics are hot and humid. It’s the perfect antidote to cold, dry ship air. And the animals are so diverse and colorful. Really, you must see them for yourself.”

“It sounds lovely,” Scout said. She was starting to mean it. She too had been cold every minute since she’d left the surface. Emilie and Seeta had given her warmer clothing, but it was like her very bones were cold.

Although the bright sunlight of the park felt lovely, it wasn’t quite the same.

“The fourth area is a temperate forest. Rather like what we just walked through, but bigger, and mine is full of butterflies.”

Scout smiled. She had seen pictures of butterflies before, but never the real thing.

“Some of them are tiny, smaller than the nail on your littlest toe, but others are immense.” He held his hands up farther than shoulder width apart and smiled at her. “They’re fascinating.”

“I bet,” Scout said, watching Shadow’s head bob up out of the grass before disappearing again.

“But the fifth is my favorite. That section is like the steppes back on Old Earth. It’s larger than the other four sections put together, but I need all that space for my herd.”

“Herd?” Scout asked.

“Herd of horses,” Bo said. “Have you ever seen a horse?”

Scout shook her head. “Only in images.”

“They are magnificent. Nothing in this galaxy compares to the feeling of riding on the back of a horse across the grassy steppes.”

Scout smiled but said nothing.

“I really do want you to see it,” Bo insisted. “I would like to build something similar down on Amatheon, so all the people who live down there can get just a glimpse of the great diversity the rest of the galaxy has to offer. Don’t you think they’d love it?”

“I suppose so,” Scout allowed.

“You could help me plan it,” Bo said. “You could help me with lots of things if you like. I value the input of the native population whenever I undertake one of my improvement projects.”

Scout didn’t answer, but she may have flinched a bit when the word “value” had popped up again. But he kept glancing over at her as they walked, clearly waiting for her to respond. She had to say something.

“I don’t know what I could contribute,” Scout said. “You’d be better off working with the governor.”

“I don’t think so,” Bo said, all the cheer gone from his voice. “The people on the surface who call themselves your government—” He broke off, heaved a sigh, and started again. “I can appreciate why the workers rebelled. I respect it, even. But that was generations ago, and the people who call themselves your leaders now are not acting in anyone’s best interest but their own. No, the first step will definitely have to be moving them aside.”

“I don’t like politics,” Scout said.

“Who does? But there’s no better way to negotiate what’s best for the most people. You do know what the alternative is?”

“No,” Scout admitted.

Bo blinked as if he hadn’t expected that answer. “The alternative is violence, Scout. The strong take as much as they can, and the weak fight each other for what’s left. Politics is how we find better solutions. I admit it’s not easy, and it’s frustrating at times when it seems like giving up would be the best answer.”

“I don’t know much about it,” Scout admitted. “You know my history, right? Everyone else here seems to know it. My hometown was destroyed when I was ten. I’ve been on my own, working every day just to keep eating. I haven’t been to school since I was ten.”

There was no way he couldn’t notice her face turning red with shame; it felt like she was radiating heat, her cheeks burned so intensely.

“But you can read,” Bo said.

“And do basic arithmetic,” Scout said. “I haven’t forgotten anything I learned; it’s just that I stopped at that point.”

“But Scout, there’s no reason you can’t start up again,” Bo said. “I can give you the resources to do that, to catch up with other kids your age, even surpass them.”

“That sounds like too big of a gift,” Scout said, talking half a step back from him and looking around for her dogs. If he gave her such a thing, she knew she would be grateful forever. How could she not be?

But that feeling of gratitude would mean a feeling of being in his debt. And he knew that she would feel it. He had studied her, just as he had studied the others—even Gertrude, apparently.

He knew just how to get to her.

“We should get back to the hospital,” Scout said and whistled shrilly for her dogs.

“There’s no hurry,” Bo tried to insist.

“No, the others will be worrying,” Scout said, although with Emilie lost in the library and Geeta focused on her sister, Scout rather doubted that was true.

“All right,” Bo said. “I understand. But I will come again to see you all tomorrow.”

He bowed and left her alone with her dogs.

And with far too many thoughts running through her head.