Gob's Arc

Chapter 6 of 11

Hoola's plan hung in the dark. Lead the saucers into each other. Use the light. But Fluroess still held Gob close, and the two glowing hands trembled. Gob felt it. His parent was afraid. And under the fear sat a question no one had asked yet. "Wait," Fluroess said. The gold light dimmed. "Gob. The beam that took us. We felt your signal first. We climbed the rise to answer it. Then the sky opened." Fluroess paused. "We came because of your light. That's why we're here." Gob went still inside those hands. He could lie. He could say the saucers found them by chance. But the truth pressed against his mouth like the light pressed against the dark. "Yes," Gob said. "I made the signal. On the roof. I flashed it across the sky so you'd see me." His voice stayed low. "The fleet saw it too. It came for the roof. It came for you. I led them here." Silence. Both of Potbelly's heads turned toward Gob. Neither snapped. Fluroess's hands closed a little tighter, then loosened. PomPom watched, jaw set, saying nothing. "You told the truth," said one of Potbelly's heads. "You could have hidden it," said the other. "I didn't want to trick you," Gob said. "Not you." Then the gold light snuffed out. Fluroess had shut off. The warm glow in the two hands went black, and Gob hung in his own cone alone. For one cold breath he thought he'd lost his parent for good. "Fluroess?" Gob whispered. "Quiet," Fluroess said. The voice came from the dark now, close and even. "They track light. Yours and mine. So I go dark. You stay bright." A hand found Gob's edge and steadied him. "You be the target. I'll be the eyes they can't see." Gob understood. Fluroess wasn't leaving. Fluroess was becoming the hidden one. Gob's light would pull the saucers. Fluroess, dark, would watch where they went and call the turns. A shape drifted into the door of light at the edge of the void. Gob's cone touched it. Fluroess, floating there, dark and calm, one hand raised. The pale saucer rims spun closer, drawn to Gob's glow. "Now," Fluroess said from the black. "Left. Down. Toward the far one." Hoola grabbed Gob and hauled him where Fluroess called. "You heard the eyes," she said, loud and fierce. "Go, go, go!" Gob blazed as bright as he could. Two saucers swung after him and clipped rims in the dark. A flash. A crack. One spun away broken. They had a weapon now. Gob's light for bait. Fluroess's dark for aim. His parents trusted him again, because he'd told them the truth. But the void still held the whole fleet, and only one saucer had fallen. Gob shone alone at the front, and every rim that was left now turned toward him.