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He curls up in his sleep, then partly wakes up, muscles tight and strained. Been too long in the same position, he thinks, and tries to straighten up a little, just enough to relax, but keeping his balance. The tree is high, and he doesn’t want to meet the ground before sunrise. He drifts back into sleep, full of whispers, cracking branches and creatures hissing in the deep shadows of the forest. Night air, like the thin veil of reality, washes over him, keeps him alert, but strangely detached from the harsh materiality of his mission. He is waiting, and never before so sure of his objectives. Cold and stiff, with his hands clenched on the gun, smeared with dirt, dog tired and hiding in treetops every goddamn night, Nathaniel Taylor is the King of the New World. He knows what he wants, and – much more importantly, he knows what he’s doing.
She’s crying, and the King doesn’t know what to do. Tate’s girl, he recalls, looking over his shoulder at the corporal. The commander could swear that the man is scared out of his mind, holding his inhalator with shaky hands, but coping, hopelessly coping, because that’s what he’s been trained to do. A good soldier, Taylor murmurs, your man is a good soldier, you’ll be fine. He pats the sobbing young woman’s arm awkwardly, grateful when a medical assistant shoves him aside with a short apology. Deborah Tate is in a state of shock, her pupils dilated, breathing shallow and rapid, her body fighting excessive amounts of oxygen cursing through her veins.
Taylor looks around, over the heads of pilgrims, over this colorful and mismatched bunch of miserable fugitives, all coughing, shaking, hyperventilating, sprawled flat or sitting in the typical of newcomers, near-stupor awe in the yellowish dust around the gate. He cannot see her first, but when he comes closer, there she is. About ten years old, crouching behind the transporter, inhaling slowly through the fabric of her tee, with both hands pressed over her mouth. The kid’s pupils are wide, but not the way that would indicate shock. She’s managed to force her body between the mechanisms of the vehicle, a strange picture of flesh trapped in metal wires. Looking for the exhale, huh?, Taylor can’t help the amusement in his voice. The girl nods, holding her breath, then letting it out slowly. She pauses before another inhale. Smart, comments Taylor, and laughs as his comment earns him a short, muffled snort. These things use power cells, he says, reaching out for the kid. She carefully takes his hand, and untangles herself from the transporter. I won’t faint, she states from behind the wall of cheap, wrinkled cotton and her fingers. She faints promptly right in front of the infirmary. Taylor is surprised she’s made it this far.
Time passes, and the King gets his Palace, with stairs, gates, flanks and the audience chamber. He’s got the Knights, and the Court. The children are playing in the cooling shade of the Palace, the good peasants swarm under its balconies, and the King watches all that with a benevolent smile. Curtain walls of sound guard their little Camelot, and everything would be just perfect, if it weren’t a dream.
Your kid seems very… decisive, the Commander leans over the wooden railing, as he points to a small group of local children playing a violent game near the western emitter tower. Sir, answers Tate, looking at the gang. Currently, Mark Reynolds is sitting on the ground, holding his shin, and sporting a vicious scowl, while Skye Tate is standing over him rather menacingly, wildly gesturing and explaining something in high, well-audible tones. The rest is keeping themselves in the background, which seems to be a smart choice of action, or rather a lack of thereof, since Skye accompanies her speech with abundant sweeps of a tree branch she’s clutching in her left hand. She’s gonna be? Taylor lets his question hang in the air. Skye’s father shrugs and runs his hand over his face. Medical assistant, I think. Debb wants her close, you know. Safe, he explains hastily. Taylor nods. At ease, Corporal, he drawls, you’re off duty. Tate sighs, a small relief in his voice as he speaks again. Deborah told her once to go and help in the kitchens, you know, our canteen. She came back with her forearm cut. A nasty one, lots of blood, five stitches. Said it wasn’t her fault. And she cried not a single tear, you now. I checked later. There are those racks, going up the support beams, you know. They use them to dry leaves and fruit. She climbed up to resupply the pantry, though they told her not to. She fell down, and the racks went with her. She got lucky it was only her arm, you know. Taylor knows. He still remembers the girl tucked under the rover, and the power in her bright voice, just before she fainted. So she’s no cook then, summarizes Taylor. But she’ll make a fine soldier. Tate shakes his head at the roar of laughter from his commander, when Skye hits young Reynolds with the branch again. Under the emitter tower there’s a full blown mini-war going on. The audience formed a circle around the two kids, and now is shouting encouragingly. Rey-nolds! Rey-nolds! Tate looks at Taylor, not sure what to make of his reaction. Don’t worry, Corporal, he smiles. They always support the one more likely to lose.
Time passes, and the King faces many beasts. He kills them, and tames them, he exerts his control over the wild, rich land. The King is betrayed and wins, the traitors expelled, the conspirators punished, and the balance restored. But when the disease strikes, the King is useless. He cannot fight what he cannot see. He cannot banish what he cannot touch. The King is a beggar now.
Skye trembles with every step to the memorial field, her fists tight, knuckles white, red crescents forming in the flesh under her fingernails. There are people all around her, a steady buzz of voices, soft, wet echoes of their steps encircling her, and the only thing that’s missing is a long wooden casket that would fit a colonist’s funeral. Her father gets a proper coffin instead, so neat, so 22nd century-like it feels almost inappropriate, out-of-place, anachronistic. The rest is as it should be, she thinks, looking around wearily. Commander Taylor addresses her as he begins his speech, the one who didn’t cry a single tear, and she struggles to live up to his words, to stay strong, to make her father proud.
After the funeral service Deborah Tate goes down with fever. Skye recalls all the sharp lines of Taylor’s face and makes her decisions. She won’t cry a single tear. On the third day of the fever, she drags her mother through a storm drain, then sits down next to her limp, semi-conscious body and waits. She’s patient, and her patience pays, when the help finally comes. Some liars never lie when it comes to business, and she suspects that’s the case with the Sixers. A little help for a little help, girl, says a tall, serious woman when Skye is done explaining. She agrees. Some choices are too obvious to mark them with words, so she nods her head and shakes the woman’s hand. She gives her a small, crooked smile. At thirteen Skye Tate learns the true value of things. It doesn’t come in terras.
We were out, the girl is looking out of the window. She won’t look Taylor in the eye, and her fingers are crushing the hem of her blouse. Out, to find some plants. Mom’s doing research- , she stops mid-sentence. She was doing research. Commander Nathaniel Taylor listens to her story, and Skye knows it’s plausible. She’s rehearsed it so many times she could tell it step by step even in her sleep. They went out. Mom got sick, got that terrible fever. They found a tree, climbed up, but things got worse. Mom went unconscious. Skye was afraid to leave her, and they were running out of drinking water. Two bottles, all they had. They managed over forty hours without sleep. On the third day Skye fell asleep. Couldn’t help it. Deborah, feverish and tired, fell down the tree. Broke her neck. Skye buried her under the leaves, and ran back to the colony.
Wash and her team found Skye Tate in the field between the colony and the forest. The girl was dirty, hungry, dehydrated, with lots of scratches and bruises. She cried. This is what Wash told Taylor. She cried, Sir. She was crying her heart out. Not now, though. Taylor observes her face, and notices dark circles under her eyes, distorted proportions between her eyes and nose, a face typical of a child turning into a teenager, clearer, more defined, uneasy. Skye Tate radiates pain that reaches Taylor in hard waves. Her silence is like a vacuum, sucking in all the surrounding sound, the warm evening breeze. She seems floating over the wooden floor, her feet barely touching it, and even though Taylor knows the girl is too short to rest her feet on the ground, the sight gives him a disquieting feeling. She’s alone now.
You’ll be under my custody, he says. She doesn’t look at him. Wash takes her hand and Skye lets her, distant and indifferent. She’s just a kid, Taylor realizes, a kid playing a soldier desperately trying not to cry in front of her commander. He nods towards Washington, ordering her to leave. Skye, he starts again, feeling clumsy with words. He’s not used to thirteen-year-old girls, so he decides to treat her like a soldier. Like a very young, fragile soldier, who’s just seen something bloody, violent, and atrocious. Get a hold of yourself, girl! Taylor risks, but to his surprise Skye blinks, and looks him directly in the eye. You’ll stay here, understand? This is what your father asked me for, and I’m going to keep my promise, Taylor is lost for words again. I’ll get you a room downstairs. Good? he feels a sudden need to explain, to excuse himself, because under her steady, searching look he sees himself a thief, as if he’s stealing her former life of her. The girl nods slowly, accepting the offer. A solution as good as any other, she says. Her voice is dry. It reminds Taylor of withered leaves, and ash. Maybe we should build funeral pyres for our dead, a brief thought crosses his mind. Skye puts her hand on the table, and starts tracing the grain of the timber with her thumb. Maybe we should, she echoes, and Taylor startles a little, when he realizes he’s just said this aloud.