“Well, I don’t,” she snapped, then reconsidered. “I have a bandanna and a knife. We could cut it in half.”
“Better than nothing,” I said.
It didn’t take long to slice Josephine’s blue bandanna in half diagonally, to use as a face mask for each of us. I pulled a water bottle out of my backpack, took several gulps, gave it to Josephine, and soaked both rags before tying mine around my mouth and nose. I automatically put the empty plastic bottle back in my pack so as not to litter, then had to laugh at myself. We were all taught to leave as little imprint on the worlds we visited as possible, so of course I would put the bottle away—but the thought of someone ever coming to this dead planet and finding a single plastic water bottle amid all the ruin was suddenly absurdly funny. I think I was a little hysterical.
I found Josephine’s hand, forging ahead through the cloud of dust and debris. There were boulders rather than trees now, giant black rocks bigger than I was, blocking the way. In some cases we had to go around, and the rocks reminded me of the last time I’d breathed in this much dust. This was like when I’d fractured my shoulder in the rockslide that had killed Jerzy.
I felt myself tensing up, expecting the ground to start rumbling and the boulders to start falling, to crush us. My heart was racing, but I didn’t know if it was the lack of oxygen or the sudden onslaught of memories. Either way, as Josephine and I plodded on, it took me a moment t
o notice the figure stepping out of the dust in front of us.
Josephine gave a sharp tug on my hand, which caused pain in about four different places. I snapped my head up, shifting my weight to my back foot—and then the air cleared, so suddenly it left me gasping.
Josephine’s hand slipped free of mine, likely so she could wipe her eyes. I didn’t blame her; I was doing the same.
“You’re Joseph Harker, aren’t you?” a voice said, and I looked up into the face of a different version of me.
Like me (and Josephine), she had pale skin, unruly red hair, and freckles. But her eyes were green, so vibrant that they seemed to shine. Her hands were held up, kind of defensively, and she was dressed like she’d stepped out of a medieval adventure novel: browns and greens, with high boots, leggings, and a plain tunic. Pouches and leather things I didn’t recognize hung from a belt with intricate tooling on it. Her hair was short enough that I second-guessed her gender for a moment; plus she honestly had the kind of face that could have been male or female.
“Yes,” Josephine said from behind me. “He is. I’m Josephine.” I’m glad she was able to form sentences—I felt like I was going to pass out with the sudden influx of oxygen. I pressed the bandanna to my face again, wiping away the dust before tying it to my belt, forcing myself to breathe slowly.
“I’m Jari,” she said, and the name tugged at my memory.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I used to live on base with roughly five hundred versions of me, all of which had names that started with a J sound. Even if their names were in a different language, or a mathematical equation, it could generally be translated to a J sound. Saying that this girl’s name tugged at my memory would have seemed vastly unimportant, except for one small thing: I’d never seen her before.
After a moment, I had it. “You’re one of the twins,” I said.
She nodded. “Yes. My brother is on his way.”
“Twins?” Josephine asked. “We can be twins?”
“It’s rare,” I said. “In fact, it was unheard of—but, yes, we can be twins. Apparently.” I smiled at Jari.
“It is not so uncommon to me,” she said. “I find it more disturbing that there are so many of you who are not twins. I could not imagine being without my brother.”
“Did it give you an advantage at InterWorld?” Josephine asked. “Like, in training?”
“We did not have much chance to find out,” Jari said.
“I never even got to meet them,” I explained. “They were brought onto the ship right before I left. They’re from a high magic world. Remember, I explained about the arc of magic and science. . . .” I trailed off, looking at Jari again. Her hands weren’t held up defensively, as I’d first thought. She was holding the dust and ash at bay, encasing us in a protective bubble of oxygen. I’d assumed (stupidly) that she’d had some sort of gadget on her at first, but she looked like she wouldn’t even know the difference between a grav-disk and a cell phone.
“How are you doing that?” Josephine asked.
“My particular gift,” she said. “Everyone on my world has one. I can adapt to any environment, or create one of my choosing in a small sphere around me. That is why they sent my brother and me out to gather food.”
“He can do the same thing?” I asked.
“He can change himself,” she explained, and turned to look up at the sky. Or, where I presumed the sky would be; there was nothing beyond our little sphere but a miasma of debris. “You do not think the appearance of a larger predator during your fight with the bird monster was coincidence, do you?” She smiled, abruptly lifting one arm to the sky—and an enormous red-tailed hawk came gliding out of the cloud of ash to rest upon her leather-covered forearm. He settled with a shuffling of wings, tilting his head at us.
“This is my brother, Jarl,” she said, and the hawk gave a quiet chirp. “He is not usually so feathery,” she added with a smile.
“Nice to meet you,” Josephine said, and I could tell from her tone that she’d once again decided this was all absurd and she was just gonna go with it.
“Same here,” I said, looking into the bird’s eyes. Bright green, like Jari’s.
“Jarl,” Jari said, getting the bird’s attention They seemed to confer for a moment, just looking at each other, though the bird showed little or no reaction and neither of them spoke again.
Finally, she gave a bounce of her arm and the hawk spread his wings, launching himself into the air. It disappeared into the miasma and was gone.