THE ALL-PRO (46 page)

The fog was so thick that, with a sweatshirt hood up, Quentin did not draw stares and throngs of autograph seekers. For this afternoon, at least, he was just some really big Human walking along, minding his own business.

He’d been summoned by Gredok. Gredok had specifically instructed that Danny Lundy was not to attend — just Quentin. Quentin had the option of refusing the request or insisting that Danny attend, but had chosen instead to simply comply. Gredok had stood by Quentin during the turmoil caused by Yolanda’s article. Aside from the contract negotiations, Quentin had never felt so comfortable around the team owner. Quentin would give Gredok the benefit of the doubt that this meeting would not entail contract discussions. If it did, Quentin could always leave.

Still, any conversation with Gredok required some prep time, a chance to clear his head, get his thoughts straight. A walk around the stadium on a foggy afternoon did just the trick.

Walk completed, Quentin gently eased his way through the packed sidewalks and entered the Krakens building. He took his usual route around the right side of the cavernous lobby. The black, domed ceiling sparkled with dots of light, a representation of the inhabited universe. The brightest dots marked the planets that fielded Tier One teams. The stars had changed since last season; the lights of Chillich and Mars were gone, replaced by the glow of Earth and Orbital Station One. Which lights would fade at the end of this season?

Walking around the right side of the lobby led Quentin past the Ionath Krakens’ proudest relic, the GFL championship trophy from 2665. Slow-motion holos surrounding the trophy showed the man the press once dubbed “The Saint of Ionath” — Galaxy Bowl MVP Bobby “Orbital Assault” Adrojnik. In front of the GFL championship trophy was the small case that held the evidence for Bobby’s canonization: his Galaxy Bowl MVP trophy and the GFL championship ring that he never got to wear. Shortly after winning the biggest sporting event in the universe, Bobby had died under suspicious circumstances.

As Quentin passed by these talismans, he ran his hands across the cases, fingers barely touching the glass, a tactile reminder that — while they were so close, so
damn
close — he would never touch actual trophies until he and his teammates earned them for themselves.

The Krakens were 4-and-2, one game behind Wabash and a half-game behind the To Pirates. Despite the loss to the Orbiting Death, it was no empty wish to think that this could be the year the Krakens put a second GFL championship trophy in that case. All he had to do was lead his team into the playoffs — from there, just three wins away from glory, from immortality.

He took the elevator to the top floor. When he stepped out, Gredok’s well-dressed thugs smiled in greeting. Quentin wanted nothing to do with those sentients, yet they felt some kind of status in knowing him, knowing they worked for the same boss that he did. All of them were dangerous, to say the least; Quentin did the smart thing and simply returned the smiles.

Messal the Efficient slid into view in his normal fashion, out of sight one second, there the next.

“Elder Barnes! Warrior Choto! Welcome-
wel
come. I trust you did not have trouble finding transportation?”

“We walked,” Quentin said. “Nice day for it.”

“Oh, of
course
, Elder Barnes. A walk in the fog must have been de
light
ful. And I’m sure you were able to relax knowing that our brave Choto was there to guard you against any unexpected danger.”

Quentin laughed softly. Messal was the undisputed heavyweight champion of sucking up.

“Well,” the Worker said, “Gredok is expecting you. Follow me, please.”

Messal led them past statues, paintings and holosculpts that were each probably worth more than Quentin made in a season (certainly
more
after you factored in Commissioner Froese’s fines).

Messal opened the double doors that led to Gredok’s private chamber, then stepped aside. “I think you will enjoy this meeting very much, Elder Barnes.”

“Uh ... thanks.” Quentin entered. As usual, Choto stayed outside. Messal closed the doors.

Quentin’s eyes quickly adjusted to the low light of Gredok’s circular meeting room. He automatically looked to the white pedestal, saw that the black throne sat empty a fraction of a second before realizing that the expensively dressed Gredok was standing on the floor.

Standing there, to the right of a large Human that Quentin had never seen before.

Doc Patah hovered on Gredok’s left.

At first, Quentin thought the Human was another of Gredok’s goons. The man was big enough for it. But he wore plain brown cotton pants and a simple brown tunic — not the tailored finery of the other thugs.

“Barnes,” Gredok said. “Welcome.”

Quentin nodded at him. “Gredok. I came alone, as you asked. What can I do for you today?”

“Today, Barnes, is about what
I
can do for
you
.”

The Human stranger smiled. A warm smile, inviting. What was this?

“Okay,” Quentin said. “Hit me.”

“Barnes, do you remember when I said I am a powerful friend to have?”

Quentin did. That conversation had come last season, after the Krakens had lost to the Wabash Wolfpack, humiliating Gredok before his rival owner Gloria Ogawa. That game had dropped Ionath to 1-and-4 — last place, most likely to be relegated back to Tier Two at season’s end. Gredok had promised Quentin that if the Krakens could stay in Tier One, Gredok would throw all of his resources behind finding ...

No.

No, it could not be.

Quentin stared at the big Human.

“So perceptive, as always,” Gredok said. “Quentin Barnes, meet Cillian Carbonaro. Your father.”

The man’s smile widened even further. He sniffed, wiped his left eye with one stroke of his right hand.

Quentin stared. No thoughts. It could not be.

“It’s true,” Doc Patah said, the metallic voice of his backpack’s speakerfilm filling the chamber. “I ran the genetics tests myself, Quentin. Twice.”

It just could
not
be.

“Quentin,” the man said. “I know you’ve got a lot of questions. I know you might ... might
hate
me. But I haven’t seen you in so long. Oh High One, I missed you so.”

The man took a half-step forward. He spread his arms, just a bit, hands maybe a foot from his hips, but the offer of a hug shone like a single star against an all-black night.

Could not be.

But it
was
.

Quentin’s feet led him forward. A haze, a blur.

Quentin Barnes put his arms around his father and squeezed him tight.

• • •

A QUESTION THAT QUENTIN
had never considered — after you meet your father for the first time in your life, what then?

His dad made the suggestion: go get a beer. Quentin agreed, moving more on autopilot than anything else. Gredok had his limo drive them to the Blessed Lamb bar in the Human district. The mostly silent drive took them to the one place where Quentin could be in public, out in the open and not be swamped by fans and autograph seekers.

The two men sat at a table, silently staring at each other in a way that wasn’t awkward, a beer bottle in front of each of them.

Cillian was a big man. Not Quentin’s size, but still about 6-foot-6, maybe 280 pounds. Light scars, some old, some new, dotted his knuckles and criss-crossed the backs of his hands. The marks of the working class. His weathered face showed deep lines, lines that seemed too deep for his age. Maybe fifty? Lines from laughter, from worry, from work, from a life clearly far from the privileges of football stadiums and interstellar yachts.

“So,” Quentin said. “How old are you?”

“Forty-six,” Cillian said, then took a sip.

“Huh,” Quentin said. “So you had me when you were ... twenty-six?”

The older man nodded. “Yes. We had your sister when I was sixteen.”

Quentin nodded. That wasn’t unusual on Micovi. “How old was Mom?”

“Fourteen when she had your sister, eighteen when she had your first brother, who died in child birth, twenty-one when she had your brother Quincy, twenty-four when she had you.”

“I had another brother?”

Cillian looked off to a corner of the bar. “Yes. His name was Quaid. Would have been, I mean. Or was. Yeah, was.”

Quentin let out a long breath. From zero family to all of this information, so fast, it was overwhelming. “You ... you know about Kin-Kin?”

“Who?”

“I mean Quincy,” Quentin said. “You know that he ... that he’s dead?”

Cillian blinked rapidly. He was trying not to cry. “Yes. Gredok told me. Forgive me, Quentin, it’s ... well, I know I haven’t seen any of you in a long time, but it’s not easy to hear one of your children has passed on.”

Quentin drank. The news of his mother had been hard, even though he had almost no memory of her. What must it feel like to learn your own child, someone you’d held in your arms, had been dead for fifteen years?

Cillian cleared his throat, nodded once as if to say
done with that
, then the smile returned.

“I can’t even describe what this is like, son. Oh ... I ...”

“Go ahead.”

“As far as I know, you hate me. Is it okay if I call you
son
?”

Quentin laughed. “Sure. I mean, it’s fact, right?”

“It is.”

“Then go ahead, because I’m going to call you
Dad
until you’re so sick of it you want to punch me in the face.”

Cillian raised his beer bottle, extended the neck. Quentin did the same. They clinked bottles, took a sip and that was that.

So many questions. One far more important than all the rest, but there were enough other things to learn that the big one could wait. “Do you know if my sister is alive?”

“I don’t,” Cillian said. “Gredok said he’s looking, but I’ve never heard from her. I take it you haven’t either?”

“I didn’t even know I had a sister until two months ago. I hope we find her.”

They both fell silent, enjoying the moment together. Quentin realized he’d said
we
to describe himself and Gredok. That was trippy — thinking of Gredok as actually being his ally, not a dangerous obstacle.

“Dad, what was Mom like?”

He smiled, looked away. “She was an amazing woman. Very devout. At least when I knew her. She was so beautiful. I loved her from the moment I saw her. I wish we could have waited to have kids, but ... well, you know what the Church is like.”

Quentin did know. Girls were expected to be married by thirteen and have their first pregnancy that same year. Sixteen and unmarried? No kids? You could bet that the Elders would arrange a marriage for you, probably to a man who already had a wife or three.
Breed fast, breed often
was the slang term used when no Elders were around. His mother and father had fallen prey to the same pressure that faced all young teens on Micovi. All across the Nation, for that matter.

“She was kind,” Cillian said. “She could cook like you wouldn’t believe. We never had much to eat, but she could make anything taste good. You should have seen what she could do with a roundbug casserole.”

“
Roundbug
casserole? But they’re poisonous!”

“Not the way she prepared them,” Cillian said. “You have to know what you’re doing, but yeah, they’re edible. Took her a full week to prep one. When we had three kids, there wasn’t much choice. If my friends saw one in the mines, I’d volunteer to kill it. I’d take it home. Your mom would prep it. She’d eat a plate first, just to make sure she’d done it right, then you kids would gobble it right up. It was meat — don’t know if you remember how hard that was to come by or not.”

Quentin tried to imagine what that must have been like for a young couple. His father, risking his life to kill a deadly roundbug. His mother, preparing it, then eating it — to see if she would get sick, possibly even die — before serving it to her children. All of this because people often starved on Micovi. For the unconfirmed, there was never enough money, never enough food.

This man said he had risked his life for his children. If he had loved them so once, why had that stopped? Why had he vanished? Why had Quentin spent almost his entire life
alone
? It couldn’t be avoided anymore. The question had to be asked.

“Dad, why did you leave us?”

Cillian slowly turned his beer bottle, rotating it, the bottom edge lightly scraping against the tabletop. “Quentin, are you sure you want to hear this?”

“I’ve been alone since I was five.” The words came out harsher than Quentin had expected. “Every day was a fight to stay alive until I started playing football, so, yeah — I want to know why.”

Cillian looked up from his beer bottle, looked into Quentin’s eyes, then nodded. “Yeah, I guess that’s fair. Before I tell you, I want you to know that whatever differences your mother and I had, she loved you and your brothers and sister very much. She would have done anything for you. She
did
do anything for you.”

Cillian fell silent. He went back to turning his bottle. Quentin waited. He would get his answers. He would get them now.

“Micovi was a bad place,” Cillian said finally.

“Still is.”

Cillian shook his head, looked up. “Now it’s a paradise by comparison. When you were just a little thing, it was ... people died all the time. A lot of people. Pogroms, purges ... felt like they happened every other month. Anyone could denounce you for heresy. No evidence was needed. Once you were denounced, the purity investigators would start investigating. The thing was, back then, the Church held more tightly to its belief that High One was always right. If the Elders started investigating you, for any reason, it was because it was the High One’s will. The very fact that they
started
investigating you meant that you
had
to be found guilty of some kind of heresy.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Quentin said. “I mean, if you didn’t commit heresy, how could you be found guilty?”