The Creative Fire: 1 (Ruby's Song) by Brenda Cooper Page B

to carefully remove monitor screens from the walls.
    He dropped a heavy screen on his right foot and pain shot up his leg. When he cursed, his helmet fogged over and he tripped and almost fell.
    He ripped his helmet open and breathed in the greasy air of the plant, a smell far better than his own stink. He set the helmet close enough to reach.
    His foot hurt. At least the monitor hadn’t broken; his boot had taken the brunt of the drop. The suit hadn’t been breached, either. The foot had a hard surface, top and bottom.
    He ran his hand across the edges of the monitor, making sure there weren’t any cracks.
    His finger encountered a sharp ridge.
    He picked up the monitor and angled it so he could see the ridge. It was dark, like the frame, but a slightly different dark. He tried to pluck it out with his bulky gloves but it was well and truly wedged.
    He glanced at the door, listened. Then he compounded his safety sins by pulling his right glove off. He slid his index finger under the slender dark object.
    A data stick?
    He closed on it with his thumb and pulled.
    It barely moved.
    He tried again. On the third try, it slid loose into his palm. It looked like a data stick. If so, it had been well hidden. But what better place to hide something than in a monitoring room where the watchers sat, not being watched?
    Footsteps sounded in the hall outside. More than one set.
    Conroy poked his head inside the room, frowning behind the clear bubble of his helmet’s face shield. His voice snarled across the comm. “Onor!”
    Onor slid his glove on, hiding the slender stick in the middle finger between the first and second knuckles.
    “I’ll report you.”
    No, he wouldn’t. Onor buckled his helmet and spoke to Conroy through the microphone. “I dropped this on my foot and had to check out my suit to be sure it’s not torn. I needed my finger free to tell.”
    “Someday you’re going to push me too far.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    Conroy didn’t bother to answer. Onor’s job was nearly done and Rex was only halfway through his task. But as if he needed to make a point, Conroy insisted on helping Onor finish while the other two helped Rex. “How’d you get done so fast?” Onor asked.
    “Didn’t. We filled the boxes. The bots didn’t come when I called for replacements, so I figured we’d come help you and maybe then they’d be done.”
    The stick slid around in Onor’s glove, almost stabbing him.
    Whatever was on it had better be good.

 
    11: Lila Red the Releaser
    Ruby tried to sound nonchalant as she told Daria, “I plan to go to Kyle’s for dinner.” Ruby had just brought Daria tea, and now she stood beside her, watching Daria’s hands as she polished a silver scrap-art pendant.
    Daria looked up and gazed at Ruby, silent.
    Ruby stood still, looking back as placidly as she could even though it seemed like Daria was trying to see inside of her.
    Daria’s lips thinned into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “Have fun.”
    Maybe Daria was sick of babysitting, or maybe she just wanted to compose herself for Suri’s imminent arrival. Her reasons didn’t matter to Ruby. She knelt down and gave her aunt a brief hug. “I’ll be back in a few hours.”
    Daria nodded, her attention already returned to her jewelry.
    Ruby had the odd sense that Daria knew she was planning an assault on the status quo and that her aunt was maybe even a bit proud of it. But Daria never talked about what Ruby did away from her, even though she insisted Ruby be in early every night.
    As she wandered down the hall, Ruby cataloged successes and failures to go over after dinner, when she and her friends would get down to real planning. She and Marcelle had talked some of the other students into believing in the test, or at least into working with them to study the other levels. Not as many as they’d hoped for, but maybe a quarter of the people in their class in this pod. Ix appeared to be offering occasional help in the form of stories or