“I acted in vid-dramas when I was a kid, but that was ages ago.”
“You were an actor?” Envy awoke.
“For a couple of years. Believe it or not, I played the son of Osopa’s Dramok father once—he was a famous vid star before the shuttle crash that killed him—but I didn’t meet Osopa until he reported for duty on the spyship.”
“Small universe. I always wanted to act.” Tina blurted it before she could stop herself. Her face warmed.
Yorso regarded her with surprised interest. “Really? Have you had any opportunities?”
“I was a tree in a school play when I was seven.” She begged her body to sink into the floor. Silly, silly fantasies. What had possessed her to admit to her private dream?
Yorso snickered until he noted her discomfort. His tone gentled. “That’s the interest we were looking for you to develop. You should have said something sooner.”
“I’ve never done it.” Standing with her arms spread, leafy branches clutched in her fists, and covered in painted cardboard hardly counted. “How can I be any good?”
“It’s the same as any other skill you work on. If you’re really drawn to it, that counts for a lot. Motivation is more than half the battle. Let’s train you.”
She didn’t dare hope. “When do you have time?”
“I’ll make time. This is great. I’ll have to download some exercises. Elocution. Improv. We’re going to have so much fun.”
Tina wasn’t sure about that. She’d humiliate herself, then her precious dream would show itself to be awful in reality.
Before she could mount a refusal, Yorso’s com beeped a text alert. He clicked it, and another holoscreen popped up. Tina couldn’t read Kalquorian, so she ignored it.
“A group of refugees was just brought in. Mostly small children. Ten infants, fourteen toddlers, six ages four to five. Four adult women.”
She got up from her chair and headed for the storage closet in his office. “I’ll grab the goody bags. So many little ones at once! The guardians will have their hands full.”
The bags had been her idea. Already packed, they were filled with picture, puzzle, and coloring books. Crayons and stuffed toys. Other useful bits and pieces. The bags had proved indispensable when it came to calming the youngest survivors. And four bags of toiletries, along with handhelds loaded with book files for the women.
Yorso opened a bin, and they filled it. He hefted it, then they set off down the corridor, heading for Intake.
They shot questioning looks at each other as a terrible squalling sound reached their ears. Tina thought of a cats in heat, though it was Yorso who identified the screeching. “Children in this part of the building?”
They turned the corner and halted in shock. Tukui was walking slowly down the hall, carrying a crying toddler girl and attempting to lead a red-faced boy of about five years. The boy was doing his best to yank free of Tukui’s firm grasp on his hand. The Dramok looked harassed, but his tone was gentle for someone having to yell over the shrieking children.
“It’s okay, Zac. See? Here she is, just as I promised.”
Tina’s gaze was all for the girl and older boy. Despite their tearstained cheeks and gaping mouths, she recognized them. The last picture had been taken a year ago, but she knew who she was looking at.
She screamed. Her cry quieted the youngsters, who stared at her with identical hazel eyes. Eyes like her own.
Tina ran to them. She scooped the boy up and hugged him close. “You’re alive. You’re alive! God be praised, you’re alive!” She rained kisses on the soft, flushed cheeks of the tiny girl. Whether they’d recognized her or were shocked by her effusive greeting, they let her kiss and hug them as she assured herself she wasn’t dreaming this impossible moment.
“Zac and Callie, it’s me, it’s Tina! Your big sister from the Europa convent. I’m here too!”
Chapter Seventeen
It was minutes after dark when Tina put her siblings to bed, having noted their continuous yawns. Exhausted, Callie dropped off to sleep almost before Tina had drawn the covers over her tiny form. Well-fed and bathed, she was a different child from the fussy, tangle-haired ragamuffin the rescue team had brought in. Her terror was absent so long as Tina held her, revealing the adorable cherub in the last holiday still Tina’s stepmother had sent.
As Callie breathed deeply, Tina extricated her finger from the toddler’s iron grasp. Callie whimpered, sensing the separation, her chubby hand reaching and grasping at air until she found a fistful of the thick pillow that lay between her and the edge of the bed. She quieted.
Tina turned her attention to Zac. He too had washed, insisting on doing it himself because he was a big boy. He’d consented to her trimming his thick, dark hair, a tribute to Tina’s negotiation skills. In contrast to his clingy sister, he’d kept as much distance from others as possible.
He watched Tina, fighting the eyelids that wanted to close. His voice sluggish, he said, “We have to escape them.”
Dread twitched in the pit of her stomach. “The Kalquorians? Clan Tukui is my family now. Yours too.”
“We can’t be family with enemies. We’ll escape tomorrow and find Daddy and Mommy. Then we’ll go home, and I’ll start my first year of school in the fall. I know my ABCs and can read already, but they’ll teach me other stuff. I’ll play football in the Pee Wee League.”
Tina winced to hear yet another recitation of Zac’s plans for the future that had been destroyed.
From the information she’d gathered, the children had been at daycare while their parents worked in the city that was now a still-smoking crater. The facility had not only been beyond the blast radius, but prevailing winds had kept fallout at bay long enough for the containment barrier to be erected. Little radiation had made it to that section of the sprawling suburbs.
The caregivers, who’d remained with their charges after the blast, must not have told the youngsters that after a month, their parents weren’t returning for them. Zac appeared to have no idea his mother and father were dead.
He was too tired to hear the truth. And too upset over having to live with Clan Tukui.
Tina reasoned that tomorrow would be soon enough for Zac to confront the awful reality. Or maybe in two days, after he’d had a chance to settle in. Or a week. That was assuming she and her clan could handle his near-constant demands to be sent home. Zac was insistent on the subject. Telling him over and over it was dangerous outside of the site had made scant, if any, impression on him.
Tina sighed with relief when he finally succumbed to sleep. She edged off the bed under the glow of the nightlight that had been in one of their goody bags and crept out of the room.
The apartment building nearest to the hospital was nice, with two bedrooms and an open floor plan. The extra bedroom was now Zac and Callie’s. Before their arrival, it had become a catch-all for Yorso’s growing book collection, recreational items gathered for the amusement of the refugees, Tukui’s paint supplies, and Osopa’s handcrafted weapons. Yorso had taken off work to spend the afternoon making the bedroom a child-friendly environment. Tukui and Osopa had left their duties as early as they’d been able to.