As I write this, it’s the next to last day of school for the students, which means not only do I get to start my summer in two more days. I’ve only got students for half a day today and tomorrow, which means I can get my work done all at school and write afterwards. I’m particularly jazzed right now, because today I’ve done the first significant work on Patience Under Fire that I’ve managed in weeks.
Now, I’m going back to try and get some more done.
Starr strode down the ramp that led from cargo bay three. Seven pallets of freight, each a collection of blue plastic containers wrapped in clear plastic sheeting still sat on the gravel-covered ground. Viv stood beside one of them, clipboard in hand.
“What do we have?” asked Starr.
“Seven pallets of ceramics, as if you could find anything else on this planet.”
The planet, Tan Seven, was completely uninhabited, except for a large and mostly automated facility, owned by an Argaelian corporation, which manufactured high quality ceramic parts for electronic systems. There was a small domed village, where the few employees of the plant lived, and a starport. The starport was little more than a flat place covered in gravel, and a prefab freight building where outbound ceramics waited merchant ships bored enough or lost enough to have stopped here.
“Are they going to Armiger?”
“No, they are going to Thim.” She rubbed her cheek and inadvertently smeared grease across it. “I got seven hundred a piece PH.”
Starr smiled. Viv was almost as good at negotiating transport prices as he was himself. That was the reason that he allowed her to check outbounds.
Viv had been a member of his crew for almost two standard years now. She was a Zarian, like he was, and to Starr’s mind, way too pretty to be a crewman on a freighter. She was however, perfectly suited to the job, reveling in the hard work and enjoying the strange sights that went along with it.
“At least we’ll be able to buy food,” said Starr. “Let’s get them onboard.”
“Aye aye, Captain. Huppy’s bringing the grav-loader around.”
“Good.” Starr turned around and tramped back up the ramp to the ship.
As he made his way through the cargo hold and up the main corridor toward the forward section of the ship, Starr kept his eyes open as he always did for anything amiss. The Nova Dancer was an old girl, having hauled mail and supplies to a mining colony somewhere and ore back to Zarius for more than twenty years before being sold off at auction. Starr had purchased her for a bargain price with the money he had stashed away during his own twenty-year duty in the Zarian Interstellar Scout Service. He smiled. He had been hauling around space just about as long as the Dancer had.
The control section was in the forward third of the ship and consisted of five compartments. The flight deck was in the front center, while on either side and slightly behind was the automed and crew common area on the left, and the bunkroom and the head on the right. Then suspended out on either side were the massive stardrive engines, each with a small engineering space reached through a narrow corridor.
Stepping through the door into the flight deck, Starr sat down in the pilot’s seat, the centermost of three spots. He busied himself plotting a flight plan out of the system. It was pretty complicated work and took him a while even with the computer. He was so immersed in his work that when Viv sat down in the seat beside his right shoulder, it startled him.
“Ready,” she said simply.
“Already?”
She nodded.
“Start her up then,” he said as he climbed out of his seat.
“I already made sure everything was ready to go,” said Viv.
“I’m sure you did.” Starr was sure too, but he had never let his ship take off without personally checking for himself. The engines started to come to life as he examined the systems monitor just behind the flight deck. By the time he had made a visual check of all the hatches and the cargo bays and made sure that both Huppy and Reed were onboard, the entire ship was humming. The old girl wanted to get back into the empty.
Starr stepped back into the flight deck and squeezed back into the pilot’s seat. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Viv’s cleavage, but he quickly pulled his eyes back to the front. He hit the large red button with his clenched fist, releasing the grav-lock. Then taking hold of the controls, he guided the ship as the engines lifted it from the ground. Pulling the nose up toward the wispy clouds, he threw the throttle forward with his left hand and felt his body pressed back into his chair.
“I love this part,” said Viv.
“I know.”
There was an advantage to landing on an almost uninhabited planet. You didn’t need to go through lengthy clearance procedures before landing or taking off. You just threw it open and flew. The clouds grew lighter and lighter and then just disappeared, as the sky grew darker and darker and then just became the black of space. Starr punched in the flight plan and leaned back.
“Have you figured out where we are going after Thim?” Viv asked.
As Starr swiveled his chair to look at her, their knees touched. She had managed to increase the size of the grease smear on her cheek to reach her ear and her eyebrow, and now there was a large smear across the top of her right breast. Starr stared at that perfectly formed though messy breast and its unsoiled twin for just a moment too long and when he looked up into her eyes, he saw a question there. It was a question he didn’t want to have to answer.
“You have grease on you,” he said, pointing. “Just there.”
“Damn,” she said, looking down. “How do I do it? If there is a spot of grease anywhere on the planet, it’s going to end up on me.”
“You’ve got some on your face too.”
“Well, that figures.”
“Did you have someplace in mind?” Starr asked, now that his indiscretion had been covered up. “To go after Thim, I mean.”
Viv shrugged. “Makes no diff to me.”
“We can talk it over at supper.”
“Do you need me now?” she asked. When he shook his head, she continued. “I’m going to take a shower.”
If you read yesterday’s post, you saw that a couple of weeks ago, I was predicting that Nova Dancer would be out by now, and indeed it is. You can pick up Nova Dancer at Amazon.com for Kindle or at Smashwords for any ebook reader. Either one will set you back 99 cents.
In a universe so far in the future that Earth is considered a myth, Captain Rann Starr and his small crew fly through the galaxy in their starship Nova Dancer, negotiating primitive settlements and vast space stations alike, carrying freight, as well as the occasional passenger who might belong to one of a thousand alien species. Dealing with soldiers and gun-runners might be everyday business for Starr, but the breakup of his little ad-hoc family is something he won’t stand for.
As I write this, I still have almost two weeks to go before the end of school. As you read it, I will have been done with school for almost two weeks. With any luck, Nova Dancer will be ready to go, and I’ll have made substantial progress on Patience Under Fire.
Watch this space for more information over the coming days.
Genius girl inventor Astrid Maxxim is back! Called to the aid of her friend Océane Feuillée, Astrid leaves her friends and family to journey to an uncharted tropical paradise. Here she must use every ounce of her ingenuity to solve the mystery of Dolphin Island.
Astrid Maxxim and the Mystery of Dolphin Island is available in ebook format for just 99 cents wherever fine ebooks are sold, and as a paperback edition from Amazon for $4.99 with free prime shipping.
Rachel Carson students were each assigned one of eight Programs of Focus. It was not all that different from having a major in college. Though the students inevitably just referred to them by their number, the programs were Natural Sciences, Social Sciences, Formal Sciences, Language Arts, Visual Arts, Performing Arts, Leadership, and Kinesthetics. Astrid and Christopher were both in Program One. Of course every student’s course of study was tailored specifically for him. Even though Christopher and Astrid were both in the same program, each of their studies were weighted toward different areas, which was why they only shared one class together. Each program had a team room, and inside each team room was a lounge area and two locker rooms, one for girls and one for boys. Astrid and Christopher walked into the Program One team room, and then into their respective locker rooms. Astrid pulled her books and digital tablet from her backpack and then placed it in her locker.
She was headed to her first class when she found herself walking along next to Mark McGovern.
“Hello, Nerd,” he said.
“Hello, Mark,” she said brightly. “How does it feel to be a junior?”
“Pretty cool,” he said, adding a little swagger to his step.
“What class do you have now?”
“Why do you care?” he demanded.
“Just wondering.”
“I have Advanced Orchestra, but you’d better not make fun of it.”
“I wouldn’t do that,” said Astrid, but Mark hurried ahead before she could add that she was on her way to the same class.
Astrid had not had a music class since Junior High, but she had been able to place into Advanced Orchestra because of her regular practice at home. She retrieved her oboe from the cabinet and took her place, to find that she was seated right next to Mark. They were, in fact, the only two oboes in the orchestra. She looked around for a friendly face, knowing that Austin played viola, but he apparently wasn’t part of the class. She spotted quite a few faces that she knew, but nobody she knew well. With a shrug, she turned her attention to Mrs. Werner, the instructor.
“Boy am I glad to see you, Austin,” she said, upon arriving at her second class.
“Oh? Why?”
“I hardly know anyone in my orchestra class. It’s good to see a friendly face. How come you aren’t in that class with me?”
“I have Concert Orchestra third period,” he explained. “This year is going to suck! This is the only class I have with any of my friends.”
“That may not be completely true,” said Astrid.
“All right, class,” said Miss Gracie. “Take your positions. We’re going to start out with some basic moves.”
When Astrid got to her third period class, there were only two students sitting in class, one boy and one girl, neither of whom she had ever seen before. Astrid took her seat and waited, but no one else showed up to fill any of the remaining seats.
“Hi. I’m Astrid,” she said.
“We know who you are,” said the boy. “I can’t believe we have a class with you. My dad said we might.”
“I’m Michelle,” said the girl, “and this is my brother Artie.”
“Arthur,” he corrected. “We just moved here from Alaska.”
“Our dad is going to be the new chief of the Maxxim Fabrication facility.”
“Oh yeah,” said Astrid. “Mr. Gortner is moving to Detroit to work with my uncle. So, you two are brother and sister?”
“We’re twins,” said Michelle.
“Not identical, obviously,” added Arthur.
“You guys must be really smart,” said Astrid. “This is an advanced class. Where did you go to school before?”
“We’ve never gone to a regular school,” said Michelle. “We’ve always been home schooled.”
“That’s mostly because we lived in the Arctic, and there wasn’t a school close,” added her brother.
At that moment, Dr. Born entered from the door at the back of the class.
“Welcome to the wonderful world of Materials Management,” he said.
“What do you guys have next?” asked Astrid at the end of class.
“Calculus IV,” said Michelle. “My dad says we might be the only ones in the class.”
“Nope,” said Astrid. “We don’t have to go anywhere, because it’s the same classroom and the same teacher.”
“That’s good,” said Arthur. “I hate having to fight the crowd.”
Astrid didn’t point out that Rachel Carson High School had much less crowded halls than any school she had ever heard of.
“It must be weird going to school with so many people,” she said.
“It’s weird seeing so many people at all,” said Arthur. “Our town in Alaska only had eighty-five people.”
Christopher walked into the room and sat down, completing the class compliment.
“Hello,” he said. “You two were in my Medieval History class.”
“This is Michelle and Arthur,” introduced Astrid. “I didn’t catch your last name.”
“Pennington,” they said together.
Dr. Born stood up from his desk and started with a warm up activity involving vector operations.
After class, the four of them walked to the quad together. They stepped into the lunch line and received their lunches, which consisted of roasted swordfish, grilled asparagus with lemon pesto, French beans with heirloom tomatoes and hot cherry peppers, and for dessert, roasted pears with mascarpone.
The following morning, Eleanor and Océane took the speedboat into Tahiti. Astrid and Penelope spent most of the morning helping Adeline clean up the damage from the hurricane. The few trees had lost many of their branches and the young women soon had a pile of wood for which to make future beach bonfires. Some of roof tiles had been damaged and they did what they could to repair it with the single hammer, box of nails and one tube of roof cement.
They went swimming in the lagoon in the afternoon, but the dolphins did not put in an appearance. Afterwards the young women warmed themselves on the beach. Penelope had just suggested going inside, when the speedboat sailed into the lagoon.
“We brought take-away!” called Océane, as the boat touched the sandy beach.
“Take-away what?” wondered Astrid.
“That’s what Europeans call takeout,” said Penelope.
“Yes,” continued Océane, hopping down from the boat’s side. “Chinese food!”
“Yay!” Astrid shouted, suddenly realizing just how hungry she was.
After pulling the boat onto the sand and tying it down, they all went inside to eat, leaving the unloading of supplies until after.
“We got Dinner B for five,” said Océane excitedly. “It’s my favorite. We have won ton soup, egg rolls, fried shrimp, steamed rice, cashew chicken, and sweet and sour pork. And because the two of you are here, we also got egg foo young and sesame chicken.”
“I’m glad we could be helpful,” said Penelope.
They all filled their plates with heaps of Chinese food. Feeling like they had been underfed for the past few days, they ate until they could eat no more. Then they lay back to let their food settle.
It wasn’t long before Astrid dozed off. When she woke up, the others had already finished unloading the supplies. It was too late to take the boat out by then, so the girl inventor used the time to check over her equipment. Aunt Penelope talked her in to going back out to the beach and playing in the surf for a while. For dinner, they ate the remains of the Chinese food, which was fine, since nobody was really very hungry anymore.
For breakfast the next morning, they had toaster pastries that were not toasted, which to Astrid’s mind, made them almost inedible. Eleanor turned on the generator long enough to check the status of the new replacement generator online. Astrid used the opportunity to recharge everything. Then the whole crew climbed into the speedboat and headed out into the ocean.
Adeline knew of several locations the dolphins frequented for hunting. They tried two of them with no luck before spotting several dorsal fins cutting through the waves between two tiny atolls.
“This is tricky diving here,” said Eleanor, as she threw the anchor over the side. “The pass here has a fairly strong current.”
“This is also a popular hunting spot for sharks as well as dolphins,” added Océane.
“I always kind of wanted to swim with sharks,” said Penelope.
Eleanor stayed topside, while the other four young women donned their scuba gear and dropped one by one into the azure blue water. Astrid followed the others down into the depths, holding the translator gear in her right hand. The visibility was amazing.
It didn’t take long before they found the dolphins. One shot right past Astrid’s shoulder. She thought it was Catherine, but she wasn’t sure. It didn’t take long before she spotted sharks either. There were dozens of black tip sharks cutting through the water in formation. She could see more sharks down in the depths but couldn’t make out just what species. A large fish shot just by her left, and it took a moment before Astrid recognized it as a yellow fin tuna.
It wasn’t long before the girl inventor saw what was drawing all the hunters. A large school of anchovies was being herded upwards by the dolphins. The sharks and the tuna were taking advantage of the situation by shooting into the cloud of small fish from the sides.
Astrid could hear the clicks and whistles of the dolphins, but nothing came out of the translator. The microphone must not have been able to pick up the calls from the distance between her and the marine animals. She dove down deeper and moved closer to the action. Finally, the translator offered a hint at the conversation in the depths.
“John hunt!” came the words from the device. “Anchovies up.”
Astrid saw two very large dolphins shoot up and into the cloud of bait fish. She didn’t need the machine to tell her that it was John and Alister. Carefully aiming the microphone around, she could pick up the calls from the other dolphins.
“Rachel anchovies! Catherine down around! James hunt!”
Suddenly the translator spat out another word.
“Alister, Adaline!”
Astrid looked around. She saw Océane and Penelope just to her left, but she didn’t see Adeline at first. Then she spotted her, she had been caught by the current in the pass and had been swept across the reef. She had managed to stop herself but was now swimming in a cloud of what looked suspiciously like blood. Worse, there were a dozen black tip sharks circling around her.
“Alister! Sharks!” the translator said again.
Astrid woke up to the sounds of rain coming down upon roof. It was a surprisingly comforting sound, and it took her a few minutes to figure out why. Then the realization suddenly hit her. The sound of the rain was present, but the sounds of wind that had seemed so oppressive for the previous two days, were now gone.
She got up and hurried into the main room, looking out the crack in the boarded up window. The rain was falling in torrents, but it was falling straight down, not blown to the side like it had been. Looking around the house, the girl inventor realized that she was the only one up so far, so she wrapped up in her sleeping bag and sat by the window, watching the falling precipitation.
It was past nine when Adeline joined Astrid in the waking world. The two of them began setting out breakfast, and when the other three women joined them they ate the last of their fruit, along with cold cereal and the last of the milk.
They spent the entire day indoors without power, but with the winds much reduced, the mood was lighter.
The next day, when the skies hadn’t changed, Astrid began to get antsy. She decided that she had been indoors long enough. The others seemed to feel the same way. Mid-day, they all decided to go outside and evaluate the storm damage. Adeline and Océane went to check on the boat, while Astrid and Eleanor examined the generator. Penelope was assigned to check out the house. They shared their findings when they returned to the house.
“The generator is a total loss,” said Eleanor. “It’s so old, I was keeping it together with bubble gum and hair pins anyway. But some flying debris hit it. It took out the whole top assembly. I honestly think it will be cheaper to buy a new one, but it’s going to be $4000 and probably more than that in shipping.”
“The money is no problem,” said Penelope. “We can order it online. In the meantime, we’ll shoot over to Tahiti and buy a gasoline generator to hold us over.”
“And that brings us to a bigger problem,” said Adeline. “The speed boat is completely up on the beach, and it’s upside down. It doesn’t look too badly damaged, thought it is hard to tell.”
“All right,” said Astrid. “Let’s make a list of everything we need to order online. Then we can make a few Internet calls.”
At dinner, the five young women felt satisfied that they had done everything that they could. They hand ordered a replacement generator, though it might take a month to arrive. They had also purchased a small gasoline generator in Tahiti, which would be delivered by a salvage team who would arrive to right the speedboat and return it to the water. That wouldn’t happen though until the storm had completely passed.
There were two more days of heavy rain. The ladies mostly stayed indoors and ate fruits and vegetables from cans. The following day, which was Sunday, started out just the same, but after breakfast the rainfall started to slow, and just after lunch, it stopped.
The young women quickly changed into their swimsuits and went to lie down on the sandy beach, taking in as much of the sun as the still cloudy sky would allow. Even Astrid, who generally didn’t believe in tanning, enjoyed the feeling of the warm rays bathing her body.
“Look!” called Penelope. “The dolphins are back in the lagoon! Can we swim out to them?”
Before anyone could answer, the rain started again. It was only a sprinkle at first, but the skies were growing dark again. The girls gathered their towels and made it to the house just before the downpour returned in earnest.
“If anybody had told me that I would spend all my time in French Polynesia huddled inside the house,” said Astrid, “I would have thought they were off their nut.”
Both Océane and Adeline gave her a puzzled look.
“I would have thought they were crazy,” translated Astrid.
On Monday, the skies were still full of clouds, but the rain was limited to very light intermittent showers and the wind was no stronger than that found in a typical tropical day. The dolphins were back that afternoon, and all five young women joined them.
Astrid cast a glance at the battery charge on her translation devices. The MX-360 had pretty good battery life compared to similar products, thanks to the batteries that Astrid had invented almost two years earlier. Still, they designed to be charged after use, and the ones that formed the basis of the translator hadn’t been. The reading on the one she carried was 29%. The girl inventor decided that she would use the translator as long as it lasted.
Astrid hadn’t even reached the center of the lagoon where the other young women were floating when a large grey form brushed past her.
“Alister! Alister!” the large male announced himself.
“Astrid, Astrid,” replied the girl, using her translator to produce the dolphin-like sound that she had chosen to be her cetacean name.
The dolphin made a sound that Astrid thought might be her name, but the translator didn’t indicate anything.
Alister sailed up next to her and she reached out to touch his dorsal fin. He didn’t do anything but roll over as if to make her reach easier, so she grabbed hold of it. He shot forward, pulling her through the water at tremendous speed. After about thirty feet, she lost her handhold, and Alister shot away, leaving her right next to Océane.
Feeling her stomach growl, the girl inventor looked up to see that it was almost 1:00 PM. She decided that rather than visit the cafeteria there in the R&D building, she would go on home. Chef Pierce could fix her something light that wouldn’t spoil her dinner that evening with Toby.
The weather was warm for late March, though it was a bit windier than one might have wished, flying fifty feet above the ground. Zipping down low, just over the tops of the saguaro cactuses and zooming back up and over the high red rocks, made Astrid smile. When a few strands of hair slipped from beneath her helmet and down onto her forehead, she broke into a laugh. She finally had hair long enough to get in the way!
Suddenly the gentle humming, which was a constant companion to anyone flying a hoverbike, went silent. The flying scooter dropped toward the ground like a brick, and Astrid went with it. She tried to steer toward a spot of soft sand, but the vehicle was completely unresponsive. There was no time to do anything else. Pushing herself away from the no longer flying scooter, she landed in the soft desert sand, just as the hoverbike crashed on a slightly firmer patch of gravel.
It was a minute before Astrid could suck any air back into her lungs. Though her entire left side hurt, there were no pains that stood out from the others. Carefully checking her legs and arms, and then feeling over the rest of her, Astrid decided that she hadn’t broken anything, at least not too badly. She sat slowly up and looked at her hoverbike. It was sitting about ten feet away. Though its frame was intact, the hoverdisks on the bottom were smashed to pieces.
Astrid tapped her Maxxim Carpé watch computer with her finger. Then she looked down at the device. The screen was shattered and there was a dent. Retrieving her phone from her pocket, she pressed the speed dial to her father.
“Hi, Astrid.”
“Hi, Dad. I’ve had a bit of a hoverbike crash. I’m alright, but I’m stuck out in the desert.”
Getting to her feet, the girl inventor looked at the landmarks all around her. Ahead of her, she could see the low rise of hills between her and Maxxim City. To both the north and south were large sandstone hills. She was north of the Saguaro Cactus Park and miles northeast of Pearl Lake. If she walked downhill, she would run into one of the many dry riverbeds in the area. They all flowed toward Pearl Lake, and between it and her was the monorail line.
“I think I can walk to the monorail from here,” she said. “It may take me an hour or so.”
“Astrid, stay where you are. How’s you’re phone battery?”
“It’s fine… um, seventy-four percent.”
“Good,” he said. “As long as it’s on, we can track you by GPS. Wait where you are.”
The storm continued to rage outside the walls of the little house on Dolphin Island. The five young women had to make due with lighting from a single flashlight and several candles. They only ate food that could be eaten cold, and concentrated on that which was in the refrigerator, since without power the food within would eventually go bad.
“I wish I knew which direction the storm is moving,” said Penelope, as they sat around the table, eating a dinner of cheese sandwiches and cabbage and fennel salad.
“We had a hand crank radio,” said Eleanor, “but I broke the crank off of it.”
“Cranked it too hard?” wondered Penelope.
The blonde nodded.
“I can hook up the laptop directly to the internet,” said Astrid. “We’ve got enough battery power to run it for several hours.”
Unplugging the now unusable router, the girl inventor connected one MPro 5 notebook to the cable. Loading up the browser, she pulled up the satellite image of the storm.
“It’s passing to the north of us,” she told the others. “It’s not moving very fast though. I would guess we’ve got another two days of rough weather.”
“That’s what I figured,” said Adeline. “We’d better turn off the computer and conserve the battery.”
“First though,” said Penelope. “We each need to send a message to our loved ones telling them we’re okay.”
When it was her turn, Astrid sent the following message, making sure to address it to her mother, father, and to Toby. Power is out here, so no phone, but we are safe and sound. Don’t worry. Love to you all. Call you when we get the power back.
“Sending your love to Toby?” asked Penelope, looking over her shoulder.
“No, I’m just… That’s just what people say. You don’t think he…?”
“Stop worrying about it. He knows how you feel about him and he has since he was old enough to stand.”
“Well…” said Astrid, shrugging. “I guess.”
That night, the wind rattling loose boards and shingles on the outside of the house, made sleep difficult for Astrid. When she finally dozed off, it was late, and she was awakened at least three times during the night. It was a surprise therefor to find that she had slept late into the morning. All of the other young women were up and dresses and sitting around the table eating bread and jam.
“Why did you let me sleep so late?” asked Astrid, as she wiped the sleep from her eyes.
“There wasn’t much point in waking you,” said Penelope. “We can’t do anything but sit around staring at one another.”
“I thought now that it’s light outside, I might take a look at the generator,” returned Astrid.
“It’s light out,” said Eleanor, “but it’s still too windy to go outside. You would be blown off your feet. I’m a little surprised that we haven’t lost the roof.”
“The house is sturdy,” said Adeline. “We are also protected somewhat by the trees.”
“I hope the dolphins are okay,” said Astrid.
“They will be fine,” assured Océane. “They will swim out to the deep water. The storm won’t bother them at all.”
There was just enough light coming in through the boarded up windows that they were able to play a French version of Monopoly during mid-day. In the afternoon, the wind seemed to die down a bit, giving Astrid some hope that maybe the storm would soon be over. Then it grew suddenly dark, and minutes later, the island and the little house were deluged by waves of rain. The girls immediately had to scramble to lay out pots and dishes under the sixteen leaks in the ceiling that ranged from a steady drip to a constant stream.
“I feel like we need to look for two of every animal,” said Penelope.
It was so dark by five o’clock that it could have been midnight. Astrid peaked out a crack in the boards covering the window. All she could see were bushes being bent by the wind and pelted by the rain.
“Astrid,” said Océane, at her elbow. “Will you come help me make dinner?”
The girl inventor followed her to the part of the room that made up the kitchen.
“You seem very nervous,” said the French girl.
“Do I? I guess I am. This is the first hurricane that I’ve ever been in. We don’t get a lot of stormy weather in the southwest U.S.”
“Everything will be fine.”
“Oh, I know it will be,” said Astrid. “At least I know that in my head. I guess some other part of me isn’t so sure.”
“You will feel better after you eat. I’m making sandwiches with the last of the bread and hazel nut spread. I want you to chop of this bag of pistachios and whatever fruit we have left to go on them.”
Astrid found a handful of strawberries and two bananas in the no-longer-cold refrigerator, and diced them up fine, along with the pistachios. Océane sprinkled them on the hazel nut spread before placing the two pieces of bread together.
“I have a secret treat,” said Océane. “We’re all going to have hot cocoa.”
“How are we going to do that?” wondered Astrid. “We don’t have any heat.”
City of Amathar 