The Creative Fire: 1 (Ruby's Song) Read Online Free PDF

but didn’t seem nearly as disturbed as he ought to be. They needed to be hurrying. “Do you know what happened?” Onor asked him.
    “The ship’s dying.” The Jackman must have seen Onor’s face, since he waved a hand. “Not today. But today it took a step closer, like when an old person breaks a hip. One of the metal struts that anchor the pod in place ripped, and that stressed some of the other parts, so the pod has been stretched like rubber. But they’ve already got bots working to stabilize the supports.” A sly grin floated across The Jackman’s face, and his eyes sparkled with a secret. “Worse for them, its torn holes between levels.”
    Onor leaned back in the hard metal chair, which had seen better years, just like The Jackman, but was still around anyway, also just like The Jackman. He and Ruby and Marcelle had been right. There were other levels. “How many? How many other levels?”
    The Jackman didn’t answer.
    “I think there’s three or four,” Onor said.
    “Not four. There’s no room in the ship for four. I measured.”
    “I need to find somebody. Can you help?”
    “Your girl.”
    Onor’s cheeks got hot. “Ruby’s not my girl.”
    “Would be if you could get her.”
    There wasn’t anything to say to that. “I need to find her before they blow the air. Got views of the cameras?”
    The Jackman had earned his name because he could access anything. But willing? That was always a harder one. The Jackman chewed on his lower lip for so long that Onor wanted to shake him. Finally he asked, “Where do you think she is?”
    “I looked at the Transport Station. It’s all chaos. Better look there again, I guess. She’s probably not in common, since they moved everybody out of there. Maybe the park?”
    The Jackman shook his head. “Park’s falling apart. Better hope she’s not there.”
    “It would be a faster place to look. Then we could eliminate it.” The more he thought about Ruby being in the park, the more likely it seemed. “Please? ’ Cause if she’s there I have to warn her about the air getting spaced. It doesn’t matter if she’s at the Transport Station, except I don’t want to be separated. But it won’t kill her.”
    The Jackman held up a hand, laughing. “I’ll help.” The wall in front of him bloomed into a full-sized picture of the work habs. It showed at least ten reds walking down the corridors and looking in doorways, calling out. As they watched, the reds flushed a boy and girl, teenagers, from one of the bars by common. They emerged, red-faced, the girl straightening her blouse. Carolyne and Jay. And after they raced off, the reds laughed.
    “Nosy reds,” Onor said.
    “Saved their lives.”
    The camera switched to darkness. “What’s that? Is the camera broken?”
    “No, that’s the park.” The Jackman grunted and pushed a button. The view changed to one high up, looking down in a wide angle. One area of the park was lighter than the rest. In the center of that, a hole gaped in the park floor. Something unidentifiable flapped in the camera’s peripheral vision, completely out of focus.
    Onor gasped. It looked like a giant knife had stabbed the park and ripped.
    “Easy,” The Jackman said, panning the camera. “There’s your girl.”
    She and a red-haired man shared a bench. He took most of the available space, leaning against Ruby.
    A blue.
    The man’s eyes appeared to be closed. His lips moved. The camera gave up no sound.
    The Jackman let out a long, low whistle. “Maybe you wish I hadn’t found her.”
    Onor flushed, but at least part of the heat blooming on his cheeks was anger. “It’s not like that. That’s no one we’ve ever seen. Can you zoom in?”
    “Yes.”
    Onor peered at the image, Ruby and the stranger so quiet that it might have been a still frame except that the man’s lips were moving, the cadence of his words showing in the whitened air around his mouth. “He’s hurt—see his foot? He must have been in the park