If Jove Stray

Chapter 30: caught on video

"Um, anytime," Lully managed. "You two will have to come over for dinner sometime. How about tomorrow?"

"I have to..." Levi began.

"We'd love to," I interrupted. "We'll bring cookies, my papa has a great recipe."

Lully bobbed his head, smiled worriedly at me and then left. I turned to Levi.

"You don't have to do anything after hours," I told him. "Put the video log down and let's make dinner. I know this is a horrible situation, but you don't have to push everything away from you."

"I'm not," he protested. "I'm prioritizing. What's more important to me, botany or books? You or my dignity? I don't mind making demands of Dashiell, not after what he's done. And I had wanted Libba to go through the video logs in case there was something Dashiell wouldn't want to hear. But now, I have to find that very thing. I need something to take to congress and prove that he was no better than O'Keefe on Earth and we let him become a tyrant here too. If he was really the President of the United States, there's something that he's done I can take to congress. These logs make me feel like there are more ships coming. There's not reason they should be going into this much detail unless they are prepping us for more to come. At least, that's my impression of it."

I put a finger to his lips and then removed it when he stopped talking.  He smiled ruefully and I wrapped my arms around him tightly, pulling him into a hug. He hugged me back, and we stood like that for a long moment. It had been too long since we were together, I thought. This was my fault. But now when Levi needed me most, I was here and by the seasons I was going to help him or confront Dashiell Turner on my own.

"Dinner first," I said softly. "We can set up the holo, and I'll help you take notes. Pas mal?"

"Merci beaucoup, ma belle," he sighed.

I pulled out some cabbage and we cooked in comfortable silence. I set up the holo-rib to our new holo, powering it from the pocket under the table. Levi shuffled over with bowls of pasta and we sat comfortable, watching the woman from Earth dictate to Levi's holo-rib. The holo-rib did its best to translate what she was saying, but Levi didn't seem concerned about the inaccuracies.

"No one here is going to know how to spell those names," he pointed out. "Dashiell might care, but then he can fix them himself."

And it continued, through a dozen people all reading this impossible list in monotone. Levi didn't budge as I cleared the dishes and I pulled out my own holo-rib, outlying my plan for environmental. My papa was right; Dashiell had cut our budget twice in the last cycle. I would use my own credits, but knowing that we were out of iron stopped me. Until we had resources, there wasn't any point. As soon as this earthstorm was over I wanted to go to the Aeneid and survey the damage, see what we would need to fix and what we'd need to do so. If Levi and I went to the satellite base, then Dashiell couldn't control him anymore.

Levi yawned, leaning against me. I reached over to pause the video.

"How many more hours are you going to watch?" I asked him. "You can't solve this tonight, Levi. And you need to sleep sometime."

"I'm in 2068," he protested. "I'm nearly there."

"That's another three hours," I countered, after doing the math on my holo-rib. "Please, Levi. You said that people are coming early tomorrow morning. I'm not going to bed unless you do."

"I just have to do this tomorrow anyway, I'd rather just watch these now," he pleaded. "Dylan, it's three hours. It's not so late, and we might find leverage."

He looked at me so hopefully with his sad brown eyes that I conceded. He gave me a smile and started the video up again, settling against my shoulder. I wrapped my arms around him, stroking his hair and wishing this wasn't how we would be spending our evenings now.