Riwenne had a dream where the moon goddess, Quilla, gave her the plans to a machine that could help them fight their newest enemy. But Riwenne is terrible at drawing straight lines, let alone a complex mechanical diagram. Will her sister Nexita be able to read the plans well enough to understand them? Or is there another way to help get the message to the team’s engineers?
Everyone Has the Plans
I brought the rough sketch with me down to breakfast in the morning and slid it across the table to Nexita. “Sorry, I’m terrible at drawing straight lines,” I said apologetically. “Or curved ones. Or whatever that squiggly thing is supposed to be.” I tapped a spot in the middle. “But Quilla wanted me to give it to you. I hope you can get something out of it?”
Nexita flipped a magnifying lens down over her spectacles and peered closer at the sketch. “I’m used to reading your handwriting, but this is something else. Is that supposed to be a crystal?” she asked, peering at me over the paper.
I shrugged. “No idea. This is the best I could do at two in the morning after a very chaotic dream.”
Amena was just coming into the room and she caught the end of my sentence. “You had another dream?” She hurried over, pulling something from her pocket. “I had one, too, and I’m supposed to give this to Nexita.” She dropped another sheet of paper on top of mine.
Nexita’s eyes widened. “Oh, this is much clearer, thank you.” She glanced back and forth between the two drawings, then looked up at us in surprise. “Is this the same thing? But what is it?”
Amena shrugged. “I didn’t get much explanation. Qachmy said she was passing on a message from Quilla because she didn’t have any faith in Riwenne’s drawing abilities.” She leaned over to compare the drawings. “I think it’s the same, though. Look, we both got that crystal in the middle, except mine doesn’t look like it’s been run over by a train.”
“Ha, ha,” I said, but I didn’t care much about what anyone thought of my messy drawing. The important thing was that Nexita understood. “Quilla said your trap for Huamani was a good idea, but it needed more power. She gave me these plans to help you modify the original.”
Nexita frowned and pulled out her notebook. “The one we made to stop Huamani when she became a demigoddess?” She flipped through the pages. “I don’t have the original trap, since it was part of the old timeline. But my notes came with us when we went through the doorway.” She opened to her plans for the trap. “Oh, yes, now I see the resemblance. These are some interesting suggestions. Hey, take a look at this,” she said, turning toward Deryt who was halfway down the table.
Deryt dropped the food he was eating and scooted closer. “Hm. It’s a start.” He tapped the squiggly thing. “But what’s that?”
Nexita squinted. “I can’t really tell.” She looked up at Amena and me. “You don’t remember anything else?”
Amena shook her head. “Only that Huamani is coming back as a demigoddess again. We have to do something different this time.”
My friends went still. They all looked at me with a mixture of fear and confusion.
“It’s happening again?” Janera said in a shaky voice. “So everything we did doesn’t mean anything?”
