Page 56 of Across the Universe (Across the Universe 1)

“Harley has brushes. And he sketched me with charcoal before he started painting me. He’s got everything I need. ”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” I say, but I’m smiling too, because she’s gotten back that spark of life she’d lost when she first got off the elevator.

“Harley!” she calls, jumping up and heading toward the end of the aisle. “Harley!”

I have no idea why she needs them. I just know that I’d face another Plague to get them for her if I had to. Fortunately, it’s a lot easier than that.

“Com link: Harley,” I say, pressing my wi-com.

“What?” Harley’s voice asks impatiently in my ear.

“Get your art box. ”

“Where’s the hatch with the stars? There are a lot of doors and hatches and things down here, but they’re all locked. ”

“Go get us your art box first. ”

“If I do, will you tell me which hatch leads to the stars?”

“Yup. ”

“Done,” Harley says, and he disconnects the com link.

“What is that thing?” Amy asks me after a moment, when she’s sure I’m done talking with Harley. “I thought you all had tiny headsets or something, but that’s actually embedded in your skin, isn’t it?”

I brush my wi-com button with my fingers. “It’s a wi-com. Wireless communication link. ”

“Does it hurt?”

I laugh. “No. ”

“So cool,” Amy exhales, leaning in. Her soft, warm breath tickles the hairs near my ear. “It’s like a phone built into your ear. ”

Her fingers brush the raised skin over my wi-com. My breath catches. She’s right in front of me, tantalizingly close. Amy bites her lip, and all I want to do is seize her, crush her against me, feel her lips with mine.

Then she steps back, dropping her hand, an unreadable expression on her face.

“Doc can, uh, get you one if you like,” I say, trying to ignore how much I want to grab her and pull her back to me.

Amy’s hands fly to the side of her neck, below her left ear. Her fingers smooth the skin. “No,” she says. “I don’t think I’d like one yet. ”

Harley shows up a few moments later. He dumps his art box at our feet. I can tell part of him just wants to run off and open the hatch to the stars, but he’s also curious about what we’ll do with his art stuff. For that matter, so am I.

Amy rifles through the box, bypassing jars of paint, nubs of pencils, and scraps of paper. She finally pulls out a pile of charcoal wrapped in thin cloth. Then she smashes it on the ground.

“Hey!” Harley shouts. “I have to make that myself. ”

“I need the powder,” Amy says, pulverizing the black bits of charcoal.

“Why?”

Amy grins. “Just watch. ”

After selecting one of Harley’s loosest, biggest brushes, she runs the bristles through the black powder, and then twirls the brush over the surface of the morgue door.

“Please work, please work, please work,” she chants as she dusts the metal with a fine coat of powder. Her breath catches.

The powder reveals the whorls and swirls of a fingerprint.