Wormhole Pirates on Orbis Read Online Free

factory.”
    “What do we have to do?”
    Charlie closed his eyes and held up his hands again. “Wait, wait,” he said. “Stop. It’s really simple. All you have to do . . . is be kids. Play. Have fun. Grow up like other children. Just be
kids.
”
    I must admit that Charlie’s words were sweeter than any toonbas I’d ever tasted, but what was he saying? Just be
kids
? We were knudniks. Our job was to pay off our parents’ debt. As simple as that. And if we didn’t like it . . . well, I had been reminded of the consequences many, many times on the Rings of Orbis.
    I had to ask, “But
how,
Charlie?”
    Charlie put his hand on my shoulder. He looked at me, but said nothing. His jaw slackened, followed by his shoulders, and his lips tightened, trying to keep a smile. To me the expression said,
Why can’t you just accept it?
But I couldn’t. I didn’t trust very many people on the Rings of Orbis. Everyone had an agenda, and I mean
everyone
— even Charlie. “Soon enough, Johnny,” he said. “Don’t rush this. Please.” The last word was a whisper, and I think it was meant just for me. For a parsec, I wondered if this was how my father would have spoken to me.
    Then his tone changed — it got bigger, louder. He shouted to the other kids, “Come on, everyone. I bet you’re hungry. Let’s eat!”
    I couldn’t question that. I was starving.
    Our new home (I liked those words) was equipped with a chow synth very similar to the one we’d had on the
Renaissance.
No more food tablets or the protein glop Odran forced us to eat. Instead we feasted on peaches, nuts, and heavy chunks of dark bread with something Charlie called peanut butter. He said it was from Earth, and it took him a long time to get the chow synth to replicate the smooth substance. Ketheria devoured it, but then again, she loved every kind of food. I liked it, too, and piled it on my bread as thick as I could. We each took turns trying to talk with the stuff stuck to the roofs of our mouths.
    After lunch Charlie handed out new skins to everyone. They were amber yellow and matched the crystal at the center of his belt. He informed us that the new skins would work for this house and the grounds, and then he showed us where we would sleep.
    Apparently, the previous tenants didn’t care much for sleepers. Charlie said that they had rested inside stimulation tanks of vitamin-fortified liquids. The nurture pods we slept in on the
Renaissance
worked in a similar way, but I could never see myself sleeping in a tank of sludge. The former owners, however, did employ knudniks and therefore had installed sleepers for their slaves’ needs. But the Citizens wasted little space on such
luxuries,
and to my disbelief the sleepers were stacked six
inside
the wall. Each sleeper was loaded one at a time and then rotated up and over the next one, disappearing inside the wall. I gave my new sleeping arrangement a try. When the thin sleeper rolled on its side and then tucked back into the wall, it reminded me of the ancient burial rituals humans used on Earth, where they stuck people in the ground after they died. I didn’t think this was going to be very popular with the other kids.
    “I use one, too,” Charlie said, noticing my discomfort. “Maybe we can change them later.”
    “I doubt it,” Dalton whispered to the kid next to him.
    Charlie overheard the remark and frowned. Max gave Dalton a shot in the ribs.
    “Ow! He’s your friend, not mine,” Dalton complained.
    After examining the sleepers, we followed Charlie out to the garden, where he told us to take seats on the stone benches or on the ground. I sat on a bench under a tall plant that seemed to shy away as I moved closer. Max slipped in front of Grace and sat next to me.
    “What do you think?” she whispered.
    “About what?” I asked.
    “About this.”
    “I love it. Who wouldn’t? It’s almost too good to be true. I’m waiting for the catch.”
    “What catch? Don’t you think they might