Breaking Through Limits (Larry Stylinson)

Chapter 19

"Did you hear about what-"

"Happened to Burns?"

Jimmy and Timmy Turnix looked at Harry expectantly and he felt as if a cool fist gripped his stomach. Still, he tried to look casual as he picked at his reconstituted lunch. There was something pink that looked like ham salad on his tray but it might just as easily have been cherry gelatin with marshmallows in it. The Academy was too far from Earth and shipping rates were too prohibitive to get much fresh food.

"Nope. What?" he said, looking around the noisy mess hall with what he hoped was convincing disinterest. This was the last conversation he wanted to be having today. After lunch he was supposed to be skipping his afternoon classes and meeting Tomlinson in the docking bay where the Needles were kept. They were going to be assigned a craft and he was going to fly for the first time. Or rather, Tomlinson would fly, he would be manning the guns. But they would be on their own in the deep dark and for the first time the targets he would be shooting at would be real. And they would be shooting back.

"He was taken back Earth-side in a-"

"Med-shuttle last night. Someone crushed-"

"His trachea." Jimmy and Timmy's identical hazel eyes were wide. Harry gave up trying to pretend interest in his lunch.

"Will he live? Do they know who did it?" he asked, through lips that were suddenly too dry. Surreptitiously he fingered his own hurt throat through the thin material of his uniform. He had bruises from where the towel had choked him the night before but his voice was only slightly hoarse.

The twins gave each other a look and shrugged at the same time. "Nobody knows who did it," they said at the same time.

"Or if they do-"

"The Administration isn't telling."

"But will he live?" Harry asked again, impatiently. He wasn't sure whether he wanted the answer to be yes or no, he only knew that he had to know the fate of his would-be rapist.

The twins shrugged again.

"They think he'll live. Even if he does, though-"

"He won't be coming back to the shithouse."

"What? Why not?" Harry pushed his tray aside and leaned across the table, searching the identical faces in front of him for answers. The twins were looking at each other again, obviously not wanting to say anything else. Finally the twin he was fairly sure was Timmy spoke up.

"When people heard he was gone, some of the underclassmen came forward," he said in a low voice. "They said that-"

"Burns and his gang had, uh, caught them in the showers and..." he trailed off but his twin didn't finish the sentence.