Sixteen
A few extra pillows, piled where my cot met the wall, gave me a comfortable chair. Taking off the shoes and tucking my feet under the light blanket should have made me cozy. The oxygen reclaimator’s reassuring hum hid the locker room’s silence. The silence of an isolated room deep under the ground. Were we below Tritium’s sea level?
I was in an alien universe. What did I want, a crackling fire like Mason’s crew? Marshmallows on sticks?
Gunfire stood at the lone terminal, his datalink synced to the screen and fingers dancing across the keyboard. Bizarre mathematical notation flickered across the screen, faster than I could read. Good. Let the maths man math. Better that than letting his paranoia overwhelm him.
I needed calories. I finished my tasteless dinner, flicking through m
