The next day, Colin was relieved to see that Genevieve looked more herself, well-rested even. After Maddy, he found that he was scarred in such a way that any small sign of depression in Genevieve sent prickles of panic to his chest. He hadn’t slept well because he’d been worrying about her, and had held her the entire night just so that he could feel her breath against his neck and the steady beat of her heart next to his. He should have been turned on by the close contact of their bodies. Well, there as a small portion of his mind that had been, he was a man after all. But for the most part, he’d just wanted to comfort her and make her feel protected.

He was glad now that he hadn’t pushed her to talk about herself. Whatever she’d been through, she would tell him about in time. That’s the way it was with these things. Anything that was so deeply festered had to first be cut open and cleaned before it could truly become whole again. She badly needed someone to be her strength. Though she had more than plenty herself, even the strongest needed refuge now and then.

So far, Genevieve had treated him with disdain, yelled at him, destroyed Maddy’s things, and had a tempest of a breakdown. But he found that he was more relieved than worried by her passionate emotions. She was strong, he thought. Not a sensitive doll that might break if he spoke one cross word, not someone who would hold things in until they couldn’t handle it anymore and decide to check out for good. Genevieve was real and alive, and everywhere she went the space seemed to fill with the power of her presence. It wasn’t just beauty that had made the others turn their heads last night. Even when she cried there was a passion to her that was almost palpable. He could see now that most of her temperament was just a mask for insecurity. Based on what she’d done to his home and how she’d been at the lab yesterday, she was the kind of person who threw herself into a task wholeheartedly once she was focused.

“What are we doing today?” she asked.

He noticed she’d put on the work clothes from yesterday instead of the dress. “Are you sure you want to come with me? You weren’t bored?”

“After one day?” She quirked a brow at him. “Actually, I liked working with plants. Can I do it again?”

The hopeful look she gave him almost made him laugh. As if the menial labor of watering the plants was a special gift she didn’t want him to take away. No doubt she would fight him if he tried to make her stay home. “Of course,” he said. “The droid parts came in the supplies. So it’ll be fixed today, but I’ll still need your help this morning.” A spot of warmth blossomed in his chest at the thought that she would be by his side for another day. That thought made him brighten.

He’d been glad when she’d told him that she didn’t have an attachment back home that she might be missing. No one, was what she had said and a part of him had risen with elation at that one word, terrible as that was because it meant that maybe he had a chance. Thank goodness they had the means for cold showers on this planet, because he’d wakened to a massive hard on and Genevieve’s soft curvy body against him. That combined with the vision of her in the gold dress last night, with her sleek curtain of dark hair, and exotic eyes had nearly driven him to try and kiss her. But that would have been absolutely the wrong move at the wrong time. She was just beginning to trust him, and he didn’t want to destroy their fragile beginnings.

Strange how he could care so much already. Two days ago, Genevieve had been an impulse buy that had given him buyer’s remorse. But now, here he was daydreaming about how good she’d felt in his arms and how much he looked forward to spending the day with her again.

“All right,” he said. “Before we go to the lab, we have to stop by Brace’s farm. He wanted me to have a closer look at the orchard data with him.”

“Yes! I would love to see the orchard.”

“It’s not much of one,” he said, trying to set the right expectations. “They’re really just stunted and deformed saplings...”

“Still, I want to see them. What kind of trees are they again? What are they supposed to look like?”

“I’ll show you,” he said, picking up his portable terminal and punching in commands to bring up pictures of Usilian Jerines. When they grew normally, the trunk and branches split geometrically along the way, making them look like something that had been scientifically engineered. Their bark and leaves were colored in shades of red, orange, and yellow, making them look as though they were flames come to life. He’d seen them in person before. The leaves were sharp-edged, so when they blew in the wind they added to the flame effect and cut the moving air to create sound. An entire orchard of them resulted in an eerie sort of music, which was why Brace’s farm was placed farther out on the edge of the town than most.

The trees weren’t being bred for their beauty though. The abundant gourds that sprouted from them were different from other types of fruit in that they contained a complete protein and would make a good substitute for meat until they could grow enough feed to support livestock. Even though Colin had seen Brace’s orchard hundreds of times already, usually with disappointment, he found Genevieve’s excitement to be infectious. And, as they lifted off in the transport, he found he was looking forward to seeing it anew through her eyes.

––––––––

DURING THEIR TRIP ACROSS the sky, Genevieve enjoyed gazing at the landscape with its brilliant palate of warm colors. From above, it reminded her of artwork done in chalk. It was a mixture of copper, red, burnt orange, and beige that shifted and flowed in intriguing shapes. There was even a spike of gold flashing in the distance. She peered at it more closely, noting how far it was.

“Is that a gold mountain over there?”

Colin glanced over as she pointed. “Yes.”

“Real gold? An entire mountain?”

He nodded. “Pretty much all of it. The surface dirt has eroded revealing the thick veins beneath.”

“Can we go see it?” she asked, intrigued.

“Sure, but not right now.”

Real gold was precious in Genevieve’s dimension. She thought of how frequently it was used in Tarmange on sculptures, facades, jewelry, and artwork. One of her father’s powerful friends had even lined the bottom of his pool with it. The most powerful of the Jinn could conjure as much gold as they wanted, which made it a status-symbol. The rest of the Jinn relied upon procurement from natural sources in an attempt to seem more prestigious than they actually were.

“Will the mountain be mined?” she asked.

“I guess. Some day. There’s no market for it right now though. Food’s been more valuable than anything.”

When they landed at Brace’s lab next to a housing unit, both of which were identical to Colin’s, he came out to meet them. His forehead was wrinkled and his eyes looked worried. “Morning, Genevieve,” he said, then turned to Colin and asked, “Did you see the alert that just came in?”

“No,” Colin replied. “Must have come in while we were on our way here.”

“The supplies are gone,” Brace said, his words came quickly, revealing an underlying panic beneath. “All of them.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Apparently it was a freak weather event,” Brace said. His tone shifted into low hysteria, which sounded odd for such a large man. “A funnel from out of nowhere sucked up the entire contents of the platform early this morning. Hensk was on his way into work and saw it touch down. It’s gone! It’s all gone—”

Colin clapped a hand on Brace’s shoulder and looked him hard in the eye. “We have to assess the situation with an emergency all-staff comm.”

“Right,” Brace repeated and took a deep breath “Assess the situation...”

“Let’s go into your office and get it started.” Colin stepped by him and headed briskly toward the lab next to Brace’s house. Suddenly Colin stopped and glanced back over his shoulder, “Genevieve—”

“I’m fine,” she said, not wanting to get in the way. “I’ll wait out here.”

“Okay, thanks.” The two men disappeared inside.

Genevieve was sure Colin would fill her in after he got done with his comm, whatever that was. She walked through the space between the housing unit and the lab, to go behind where she’d spotted the neat rows of the orchard from the air. As she drew near to it, she was struck by how right Colin was in his description of the saplings. And then suddenly, she had to pause and breathe for a few moments, hand pressed to her stomach as a wave of nausea swept over her entire body. It was as if someone had thrown a cloak of illness over her, and it was several moments before she could get it under control and straighten. As before, she wondered if something she’d eaten was affecting her, but then again found that the feeling wasn’t originating from her but from the orchard. How did the others stand the discomfort?

She fingered the slender trunk of the poor sapling nearest her. It spiraled upward oddly as though it had been fighting in its growth to be erect, but something kept pulling at it. It was also a sickly, translucent red, and the first clusters of leaves remained curled into tight little balls as if afraid to unfurl. She stroked first it, then another nearby, remembering the pictures Colin had shown her and thought about how beautiful these trees would be if they did make it to full maturity here on this planet.

“You poor things,” she murmured. “You’re trying so hard. Believe it or not, you’re doing well,” she said. “Here you are on a strange planet, not feeling quite yourselves. Who can blame you for not being at your best?” She felt a strange kinship to the young trees as she said it. “But don’t give up, everyone really needs you to succeed, including me. Just keep trying and please hurry.”

She wasn’t sure how long she stood there talking to the saplings. Her mind wandered, from them to thoughts of how good it had felt to lay in Colin’s arms last night, to just have someone be there for her while all her fears washed over her. She was a bit embarrassed about the episode and blamed it on the drinks she’d had, but Colin hadn’t seemed to be put off by her tears. This morning, he’d looked at her the same way he had before, and she’d felt the tiniest bit of relief at that fact.

Suddenly, she could hear him calling and turned to see him waving at her. “Genevieve? We have to go.”

“Okay,” she called back and went to him, noting how grim he looked as she drew close. “What happened?” she asked once they were in the transport.

“It’s bad,” he said as he powered the machine up and steered them into the air again. “All the food is gone. There’s not even a trace of it on the sensors. They could be scattered in tiny pieces from here to the other side of the planet for all we know. I sent a couple of scouts out to have a look. But from the bits left at the platform, whatever turns up isn’t likely to be useable.”

“Okay,” she said, “But everyone has the food synthesizers, so we should be fine until they can send more, right?”

He shook his head. “That’s the thing. Food synthesizers don’t run on air. We hook the nutrients to them, that’s how they work, remember? I pointed out where the canisters were before.”

“Oh yeah,” she bit her lip. “But we ate this morning, so we still have food left, don’t we?”

“I had everyone take a quick inventory of what they had left. If it was only the staff, we could have rationed everything until an emergency replacement came. It would have been tough, but we would have made it. However, with the added headcount of helpmates, there’s only a few days’ worth left, and that’s with rationing.”

Genevieve was silent as she absorbed this new information, stunned by the impossibility of it. “But can’t they get a ship here faster? Isn’t there anyone nearby who can share what they have?”

Colin let out a wry choke of a laugh. “We’re far at the edge of this universe, and the last stop for the ship that sent the supplies we just received. There’s no one and nothing nearby who can send up help in time.” He clenched his jaw then said, “What that means is that it looks like we’re going to be the first to starve instead of the last.”