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A shadow passed behind TeyTey where she waved her arms, sharing more tips, before I took off for a final lap.
JayJay’s deep lawnmower voice boomed even inside my helmet. “What are you doing out here?” He wound through the course and bent over the rebar tops, capping them with somesoft frisbee-looking thing he must have dug up from one of Makir’s heaps of crap. “This isn’t safe.”
When did he get here?
TeyTey placed a reassuring hand on JayJay’s arm. His forehead ridge immediately flattened. “We’re being careful,” she said.
When he turned to face me, his forehead ridge bunched into a furrow once more. “You should be riding double in case something goes wrong.”
The smile slipped from my face. What was with this guy?
“I can sit behind you and instruct you.”
Seriously?! He wasnotriding behind me. I might have allowed another Rock Dweller—Sully, Tino, or Sannit—they had been nothing but kind when I’d stayed in the sono with them. A bunch of overly loud jokesters, constantly pranking each other like siblings. I could’ve been right back in my costume design studio on set, relaxed and at home, with any of them but bossy JayJay. No way.
“I’ve been at this for hours. TeyTey’s a great instructor.” My hands were starting to cramp, and I knew I didn’t have much time left before they seized as I rubbed them on my thighs.
TeyTey’s head ping-ponged back and forth, riveted by the exchange.
JayJay narrowed his eyes at me as if searching for something hidden. “Show me what you’ve got then. I’ll judge whether your instruction has been adequate.”
TeyTey harrumphed beside him. “You do realize I have a perfect driving record?” Then she lifted her chin toward me. “Yes, why don’t you show him what you’ve got, Ginger.”
JayJay was gigantic, and though he stood below me, his eight feet of huge still loomed. Gray-skinned and entirely hairless—as far as my imagination roamed, anyway—his three blocky fingers tapped impatiently against his thumb. With his hatlessbald head shining in the weak afternoon sun, I guessed he was impervious to the cold. All of that I could handle, but his stern-faced, wide-stanced, loud-mouthed overprotectiveness I could not.
A rush of anger washed through me, and the desire to prove myself pulsed to my fingertips. He had no authority over who could and couldn’t drive a hoverbike. His permission meant nothing to me. “How’s your driving record, JayJay?”
He shuffled his feet until the tops of his boots met the snow. “I’m an expert in evasive maneuvers.”
Yeah, expert in evading the topic. “Sounds like TeyTey might be better qualified.” As I adjusted the loose helmet, I couldn’t stop my smirk.
I’d show him how independent women from Earth could be. I clenched my mittened hands over the handlebars and twisted hard, my cramped hands protesting. Throttle engaged, I surged forward. My hair whipped against my helmet, and the downdraft shot a burst of icy shards into the air, biting into my cheeks and washing JayJay and TeyTey in a powder of blue sparks.
I attacked the course. The twisted metal poles flashed in front of me one after another, like I was a downhill skier on a slalom course.Swish, swish, swish. My body slammed from side to side as I threw my weight into each curve. I jerked to the right then rocketed to the left, preventing the bike from fishtailing. Numb fingers cranked the throttle to maximum. Powering through the course, every muscle thrummed with energy.
My mind narrowed to a focus so tight that my physical body operated as if it were its own separate entity. My chest heaved and my heart boomeranged around the obstacles in sync with my bike. Guided by some unknown instinct, I skidded through the air sideways and switched directions. The poles blurred as the cold and speed stung my eyes, and I cranked my neck to tackle the course in reverse.
The last pole appeared quicker than ever before. I slammed the brakes so hard I spun 180 degrees, before lowering the bike to the ground and coming to a face-to-face stop with the open jaws of my audience.
I dismounted, my knees wobbling, loose like Jell-O, but I didn’t show it. Could my hands form fists? Nope, but I wouldn’t let on that that was a problem either.
“Bless the goddess Sola.” TeyTey jumped up and down. “I believe you are a…what do you say on Earth? Natural?” She walked easily through the thick snow and wrapped her warm body around mine in a fantastic hug. “Absolutely unbelievable.” She shook her gray head. “But as I’m not a Rock Dweller racing team member, and nor do I want to be, I’ll do the honors of driving us back to Makir and Geo’s.” Still grinning, she finally acknowledged the towering giant looming beside us. “Even you must count that as a pass?”
JayJay’s slab-like shoulders rolled, and one of his three fingers fiddled with the frayed hole in the knee of his pants. “That was reckless.”
My inner seamstress bit back an offer to fix his pants for him. I had to admit his presence might have made me up my game and throw safety by the wayside.
The cold seeping under the helmet sent a chill through my body. “And evasive maneuvers aren’t?”
His eyes, like a forest at midnight, held mine. “It’ll do,” he begrudgingly agreed.
TeyTey snorted, but much to my surprise, JayJay’s dismissive response didn’t bother me. Cold rolled through me in waves. The tip of my nose no longer had any feeling when I wiped it with the back of my mitten. Major adrenaline crash.
JayJay stomped toward me, flattening the snow around him, and then, as if forced, he stopped and spun back toward TeyTey. “Get her back to Makir and Geo’s before she freezes to death.”
Hmm… I guess he’s more observant than I give him credit for.Either that or I was more obvious than I wanted. Before I could stop her, TeyTey bundled me up and helped me onto the hoverbike, slipping in front of me in a flurry of fussing. Although much smaller than the eight-foot-tall Rock Dweller men, TeyTey still loomed—a force to be reckoned with.
JayJay marched through the field, following us, and bellowed another imperious demand, “I’m still accompanying you to the rocky outcrop. Your sense of self-preservation is skewed. Com me before you leave.”
