And he did, he thought, catching the glimmer of quickly suppressed tears in her eyes, as he turned away. She watched them go, then cleared her throat.

  “It was nothing, Mr. Zymes. Just doing my job,” she called.

  Jervis gave her a half wave, but he didn’t look back. Instead, he forced himself to keep his walk casual. He was aware of the anxious look on Keelie’s face, but he didn’t return it. Instead, he addressed his son.

  “What do you say, Hages? You feel up to a day of school, tomorrow?”

  At mention of school, Hagel’s face fell.

  “Aww, dad. Do I have to?” he whined, and Jervis pressed his lips together in a firm line.

  “We’ll see how you feel, tomorrow, son, but you should be fine.”

  He was aware of the sharp glance Keelie threw in his direction, and he looked over at her, forcing a smile to his lips.

  “What do you say, mummy? Should we buy a pizza on the way home?”

  “Pizza!” Hagel said, and Keelie’s frown deepened, before she mirrored the smile on Jervis’s face.

  Any other wolf, seeing them would have known those smiles for what they were—a baring of teeth, two parents signaling they were in agreement over the protection of their cub. Keelie might not know what he was up to, but Jervis knew she trusted him, and would follow his lead.

  It was good enough, because if there was an attack planned, they had to try to make it aboard a ship tonight. Any ship. Even a freighter would do—and the best pizza on Lunar One was served right beside the spacers’ lounge.

  Jervis waited until they had left the school precinct before picking up the pace. He wanted to discuss things with Keelie before they hit the pizza place, and a quick detour through the hydroponics dome wouldn’t be out of character for a family of wolves dealing with a bit of schoolyard trauma. Hagel was beside himself with glee.

  “Pizza and the park!” he exclaimed, as Jervis led them through the airlock entrance leading to the tree zone.

  Even Keelie relaxed as they stepped out into the shadows of a stand of pines.

  “Morrow pines,” she murmured, taking a deep breath, and savoring the scent of the trees.

  “It’s the closest they could get to the ones on Earth,” Jervis said, and then wished he hadn’t.

  He missed the great trees of his birth place. Even though Australia wasn’t where his people had originated, there had been pines…and eucalypts. He’d loved those, too. Jervis sighed, and looked up at the trees, and then he looked through the treetops and the clear plas-steel canopy of the dome. Far beyond it hung the browned and blackened planet that had once been his home.

  Keelie followed his gaze, and then Hagel looked up, too.

  “I miss it,” their son said, and Jervis heard tears in his voice—and that reminded him that they didn’t have too much time to find a haven, if they had any at all.

  “This way,” he said, drawing his little family away from the well-worn path leading to the other side of the dome, and out into the busy starport of Lunar One.

  Keelie looked swiftly around, twitching an ear, in a most un-humanlike manner, and flaring her nostrils to pick up the scent of anything hidden.

  “Hurry,” she said, sweeping Hagel from the ground and stepping hurriedly into a stand of rhododendrons and camellias on the other side of the pines.

  Jervis followed quickly, ducking down beside her just as the inner door to the airlock hissed open. He stared at his mate, wide-eyed, and noticed she held a finger to her lips. He glanced quickly at Hagel, and saw he needn’t have worried about his son missing the seriousness of their situation.

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  The pup had picked up his mother’s cue, and covered his mouth with both hands, his bright eyes flicking back and forth, watching the expression on each of his parents’ faces.

  They crouched behind the screen of bushes, listening carefully.

  “And you’re sure they came in here?” a woman’s voice asked.

  “Yup. Nurse said they were heading home, but I know wolves; something traumatic happens to one of the family, and they head straight to the dome.”

  Jervis saw Keelie’s top lip curl, but, before he could react, Hagel had lifted a hand and slapped it over his mother’s mouth. If they weren’t so obviously being hunted, Jervis might have found the look on Keelie’s face funny.

  “And you’re sure they came this way, because….”

  “Apart from the fact they’re wolves?”

  “Yeah, cos I only have your word for that.”

  “Fine. The kid yelled out ‘Pizza!’ like he was going to get a treat after the way he’d behaved, and this is the quickest way from the school to the Lounge.”

  “What makes you think they’d head to the Lounge? They’ve already booked their passage. Won’t be going for a week. Plenty of time for us to nail ’em.”

  Jervis wrapped his arms around Hagel, smothering the cub’s frightened whimper in the depths of his jacket and his hug. The bushes around them rustled, and Keelie gave him an accusing stare.

  “What was that?” the woman, again.

  “Probably nothing. You know the nature lovers stuck a whole lot of birds and shit in here to keep the biosystem running.”

  “I still thought I heard something.” The woman sounded like she was coming closer.

  Jervis saw Keelie tense, a she-wolf preparing to defend her cub. He felt Hagel grow stiff in his arms, resisting his hold, but not yet struggling, and he waited. Something small burst through the leaves away from them, its warbling chitter echoing in its wake as it scolded them.

  “See?” the man said, crowing over being right. “Just birds and shit. They didn’t have any reason to stop. We’ll probably lose them in the Lounge if we don’t get a move on.”

  The woman wasn’t convinced…or she didn’t want to concede defeat.

  “Why the Lounge?” she asked, and her partner laughed as though she should have known.

  “Cos the pizza place, there, is the best in all Lunar One—and all the spacers go there. It’s the most likely place to find someone who’ll take you off this rock.”

  “Fine! Lead the way.”

  Jervis, Keelie and Hagel stayed silent and still, as they listened to the pair move toward the exit to the Space Lounge. They waited a little longer, as a group of teens came through the airlock to shortcut their way to the pizza place, and then they slunk as far away from the path as possible. When they found the dome wall, they stopped by the narrow moat of running water that flowed around the dome’s inner lining.

  “We have to leave,” Jervis said, and Keelie rolled her eyes at him, as if to say she already knew that. He ignored it and continued. “Is there anyone we can call to pack up our gear?”

  “I don’t know,” Keelie said. “I wouldn’t want to send any of our friends into danger. You never know if they’ll be waiting.”

  She didn’t have to say who ‘they’ were; they both knew the anti-lupine faction of humans was starting its move. Hagel whimpered again, and slunk further along the wall. He was making for the spaceport, his body language shouting their need to escape louder than words.

  Taking the cub’s lead, Keelie and Jervis followed.

  “Where are we going?” Keelie asked, but all Jervis could do was shrug.

  Something in Hagel’s movements told him the boy had a specific destination in mind, but he didn’t know where, or what, or even who. They had often come to the dome, and Jervis had always let the boy play with the other cubs, while he and Keelie stayed and talked with the other lupine parents.

  There was no danger in the dome, but they’d kept a close ear on their cubs’ whereabouts nonetheless. Nothing had ever gone wrong, and Hagel hadn’t stayed away any longer than the rest.

  At least, he hadn’t stayed away any longer than any of the rest that they’d noticed. Watching him, now, Jervis was a little surprised when the boy shifted to wolf form, and looked expectantly over his shoulder. When Keelie and Jervis just looked at him, Hagel gave an impatient ‘yip’ and bounced back a few steps toward them.

  As they watched, he shimmered back into human form, took two steps back the way he’d been heading, and changed back into a wolf cub—a wolf cub that looked back at them and gave an impatient yip, its fluffy tail waving as it danced on the spot.

  Keelie looked at Jervis, and shrugged, and then she shifted into the silver-grey form of a she-wolf, and bounded after their son. Jervis hurried after them, becoming a slightly bigger and darker wolf, as he followed their example.

  When they’d travelled nearly the full length of the dome, Hagel skidded to a swift stop, and turned back at them. He lowered his head, flattened his ears, lowered his tail, and growled. From a wolf cub to its parents, it was an amazing display of insubordination, and Jervis tamped down the urge to grab his cub by the scruff of the neck and shake him into submission.

  Instead, he stopped. He lowered his head and flicked his ears forward, waving his tail slowly from side to side. Beside him, Keelie did the same. As soon as he was satisfied his parents would wait, Hagel gave another bounce, accompanied by a series of very soft whining whuffs, as he turned to face the direction he’d been heading in.

  And to their surprise a voice—a very human voice—answered.