by Ann Aguirre
“Okay,” I said.
“You’re standing right on top of one of Nadim’s main arteries,” she said. “The blood in there is moving very, very fast. I need you to focus, all right?”
I could actually feel the hiss of the liquid passing underneath my feet, a purely physical sensation that made me feel dizzy and a little sick. “What do you want me to do?” But I already knew. I just didn’t want to think about it.
“Use the laser scalpel and cut it open and get inside,” she said. “It’ll carry you part of the way. I’ll tell you when you need to get out.”
I didn’t bother trying to tell her I couldn’t, not this time. Surviving meant I had to. So I fumbled the laser scalpel out of my utility belt again; I was glad it was firmly attached, because I dropped it twice before I got a good grip. Focusing the light on it, I saw the deep slashes in my hands and fingers; no wonder I could barely feel anything. Shock must have clamped down hard, and the Leviathan blood had created a sticky rainbow film over the damage, sealing it almost like the skinsuit.
I sliced down with the laser scalpel—one decisive cut that opened up the tissue wide enough to allow me through. I braced for the pain, but oddly, it didn’t come. This tissue didn’t have nerves to damage. The thick wall of the blood vessel parted, and silvery liquid flooded out in a spray that nearly knocked me over.
I slid myself in feet first, hanging on to the rubbery edge as an irresistible tide tried to pull me free, and with my other hand used the laser to burn the edges together, right up to the edge of my grip. I hoped he’d be able to heal that relatively small tear quickly.
“In,” I gasped to Bea. The pull of the current was intense, and I couldn’t hold on for much longer.
“Trust me,” she said. “I’ve got you. Let go.”
It was like being blasted into orbit. I held myself as straight as I could and the tide carried me. It felt good to just relax, at least for a moment. Beatriz would tell me when to move again.
An alarm went off in my ear, and I flailed, turning in the current. I had to level out. If I blocked the flow of his blood, that would be worse still.
“What the hell is that?” I asked Bea, and for the first time, I sounded more like the old Zara.
“Oxygen alert,” she said. “Your suit can’t manufacture enough to last much longer, not under these conditions. It was never meant for this. Try breathing slowly, okay?”
“Sure,” I said. “That sounds easy.” Just the idea made me want to suck in another, deeper breath. Nothing like the threat of suffocation to make you want to gulp air. I felt a little giddy, which was probably the falling O2.
“Focus, Zara. I’m going to give you a countdown from five. All right? Here we go. Five—four—three—”
The edges of the artery were brushing my shoulders now and still narrowing. I tried not to breathe too deeply. My vision glittered at the edges, and I felt dangerously light-headed. Bea’s voice sounded far away. Was she counting in Portuguese?
“Now, Zara! Cut your way out now!”
I spotted a minuscule tear ahead. Twisting, I managed to hook a hand in it—and the effort nearly tore my shoulder from its socket. I didn’t realize I’d been going that fast, but fighting the current and getting my other hand in place felt like lifting three times my body weight. When I pushed, the tear widened, and I wiggled out, shoulders, then hips, like a baby being born. I emerged in a forest of strange, thick filaments, and I squirmed through them, trying not to pull any loose. I was breathing deeper now, but it wasn’t helping. My head hurt. My vision was fragmenting into strange sparkles.
Then I was in a wider tunnel, this one smooth and similar to the connective ducts. The skinsuit was barely breathing for me now, no matter how deeply I dragged the air in; I wanted to rip it off, but if it was still trying to feed me oxygen, that meant the atmosphere here in this tunnel was toxic. “Bea?” I managed to gasp out. “Where?”
“Go straight!”
I stumbled on and then slipped when I stepped in something slick.
The processed-waste flow.
It seemed to take forever to stagger to the end of the tunnel to the mesh that marked the beginning of the human-built sector, but eventually I slid under a flap and into the familiar sludge so comforting I almost wept.
Hard tremors set in as I half crawled toward our section of Nadim. The skinsuit had quit breathing altogether now, and my vision was nearly dark. I stripped the mask off as I splattered out of the hatch and onto the floor.
Air. Sweet, wonderful air. I dragged it in, out, long gasping, raw breaths, and finally realized someone was talking to me. Beatriz. She was frantically telling me she was on her way.
I collapsed in a puddle of ick. No idea how long it took Bea to find me, but she didn’t bother with the biohazard suit. She was liberally splashed with muck as she rushed to my side in the narrow waste tunnel.
“Hey,” I said vaguely as she grabbed my arms and started to drag me. “I made it.”
She didn’t answer; she was putting all her effort into moving me. I tried to help; by the time she managed to get me into a corridor, I rolled up to my knees and let her help me to my feet, and together, we stumbled to the med bay.
Medical intervention came in the form of an Earth-style bot, programmed with all the knowledge modern medicine and alien tech could devise, along with an impressive range of pharmaceuticals. The Emergency Medical Intervention Treatment Unit hadn’t been built for beauty, so it was all boxy chrome, speakers, cameras, and spindly arms that could grasp, pull, twist, or inject with ease. I hadn’t needed EMITU since we’d come aboard, so the thing perked up when I stumbled through the door.
“Honor Cole. You are injured. Processing severity.” EMITU’s voice had a definite old-school robo reverb, no uncanny valley there. The downside was it also couldn’t manage empathy, so his cheer sounded like ghoulish delight. “Looks like we need to amputate. You will enjoy your new robot hands, manufactured by Jitachi, the industry leader in medical robotics.”
My head was clearing, but for a long second I was almost sure I was hallucinating. Then I was sure I wasn’t. I stopped cold and hid my butchered hands behind my back. “No way!”
“Only a little bedside levity. Are you not crazy entertained?”
From what I knew, EMITU wasn’t supposed to have a sense of humor. I turned to glare at my companion. “Bea! Did you hack this thing?”
“It’s great, right? I gave it some personality, over five hundred slang words, some I invented.” She was using handfuls of medical wipes to clean the waste off her skin. “And you’re in no position to complain, okay?”
I mumbled some choice Zone slang as Bea helped me out of my skinsuit. The med unit herded me into a decon shower, and the spray smelled overwhelmingly like the cheap pine cleaner they favored in institutions. It would have been reassuring if the mist had stung; I could see the damage to my flesh, but I couldn’t feel it.
“Diagnosis: permanent nerve damage. Regenerative course required. Unless you want those robot hands?”
“Oh my God.”
“Then please dress, Honor Cole. I’m not here for the booty.”
Despite myself, I laughed. I put on the treatment gown and lay back in the chair. Permanent nerve damage didn’t sound good, and the seriousness of it sank in fast. I realized I was breathing deeply, trying to make myself stay calm . . . and then Bea sat down next to me. “Hey,” she said, and touched my shoulder. She was trying not to look at the mess of my hands. “I need to go back up there. We’re good for now, but . . .”
“But you should keep alert,” I agreed. I swallowed hard. “Bea, I’m sorry. I should have told you when I found out about Nadim’s problem. But I honestly didn’t think it would happen. I didn’t.”
“I know. And you were wrong.” But her hand stayed gentle on my shoulder, and she smoothed my hair back from my face. “We’re not out of this yet, Z.”
EMITU told me to close my eyes, but the minute I did that, I thought that Mr. Personality would
probably imitate a buzz saw. Beatriz walked away, so there was nobody here to check the thing if it went full horror show. I kept my gaze locked on EMITU, but it only prepped a syringe. Though I tensed, I still didn’t feel any pain when it jammed the needle home in my hands. Not then. About thirty seconds later, the feeling came back in an excruciating rush, liquid fire from wrists to fingertips.
“Has sensation returned?”
“Yes.” I hissed it through a clenched jaw. It was that or sink my teeth into my arm and chew off the offending limbs.
“I can give an injection for the pain, but I cannot expedite healing until the regenerative treatment runs its course. To attempt both simultaneously could result in a catastrophic shitstorm.”
That was the best verbiage I’d ever heard from medical personnel. I imagined Beatriz cackling as she made her upgrades, and it occurred to me that she and I were two of a kind; she just rebelled in quieter ways. No wonder we got along so well. Most of the time, when I didn’t screw it up.
“Understood.”
“I am applying a protective sealant to discourage foreign matter as your wounds heal. Please return in twenty-four hours.”
“Sure.”
The stuff EMITU sprayed on my hands came out pink and looked like flesh caulk, basically. It molded over the gashes, at least, and while they still hurt, at least I didn’t have to look at the gaping edges. Next I got an injection straight to my neck and my pain receptors all went on vacation. Such fast-working meds actually made the top of my head tingle. Right, this is probably how Derry got hooked on chem. My relief was so great, my whole body slumped, and I closed my eyes in the chair for a few seconds.
“You will live, Honor C. Get out of my office.” The last sentence was pure Bea.
Now that it seemed like I would survive, and better yet, without pain, I mustered the last of my energy to get cleaned up, then stumbled to find her. When I got to the control room, she barely glanced up to verify proof of life. She was drenched in sweat; clearly we weren’t out of the woods yet, and it had cost precious time towing my ass to EMITU.
I didn’t speak as Bea flew Nadim on a complicated course to avoid the rolling, seemingly random paths of the big- and medium-sized chunks of rock, passing through the last of the debris field. Then it was just cold and dark and lonely, and I suspected neither of us had ever seen anything more purely beautiful.
Beatriz sat back in her chair and covered her face with trembling hands. She still had some crap in her hair and smelled like the waste tunnel. She quaked like an autumn leaf in a storm.
I put an arm around her. “Thank you. Thanks for saving us.”
She elbowed me, hard. “It’s your fault we’re in this mess in the first place, and if you keep anything else from me, I’ll kick your ass.”
Normally I’d be like, You’ll try, but she’d earned my genuine repentance. “Look, I really am sorry. But you know, if they’d leveled with us back in training, maybe I’d have known better. So it’s maybe not entirely my fault . . . ?” I tried a coaxing smile that used to work on some of my counselors, the soft-hearted ones anyway.
With a sigh, she said, “Fine. I accept your apology. And . . . thanks to you too. I didn’t crawl through Nadim’s organs. You did. And look at you!” She lowered her hands and glared at my hands. “Is that the best EMITU could do?”
“It’ll heal. And it doesn’t hurt, which is all I care about right now.” I flexed my fingers a little and winced. “Okay, it almost doesn’t. Just feels weird as hell. Also, I love you, Bea, but you need a decon shower.”
“I know,” she said. “I also need to crawl into bed and pull the covers up and pretend this never happened, or I’ll never sleep again. What are we going to do if this doesn’t work?”
I just shook my head and used my newly useful fingers to chart a course to the red giant’s glow—a glow that would wake Nadim.
I hoped.
That optimism died in the hissing, atonal light of the star we orbited for almost a full day, to no effect. I could hear the star—what Nadim would have called its song—but to my limited human understanding, it was a frightening, metallic hiss of roaring radiation. I knew because I processed the energy as sound through the console speakers. Couldn’t take more than a few minutes of it before I shut it off, but I hoped it would be the healing balm that the Leviathan needed.
But Nadim didn’t awaken. I sat up, staring at the screen until my eyes ached, listening. Pressing my hands to the wall. Calling his name out loud until my voice went rough and cracked.
I felt silent inside. Dark as the space between stars. Wake up. I wanted to scream it, pound on the walls until my hands were bloody, until he heard me. We were here. Around a star. And he wasn’t coming back.
Bea brought me a cup of hot tea with lemon and honey. I couldn’t remember how long it had been since I’d eaten or slept. Too long. I drank the tea too fast, and didn’t care that I burned my mouth. Bea sank down on the floor next to me. “Anything?” It was just something to ask. She knew I had nothing to tell her. I just shook my head. “I did some reading. Maybe it just takes longer. Maybe the star isn’t giving off the kind of radiation he needs.”
“How would we know?” My voice sounded thin and rough, and I tried some more tea. More carefully this time.
“Without Nadim to tell us? Maybe we need to call Typhon.”
I shuddered at the thought. “And say what, exactly? This is Nadim’s last chance. If he doesn’t graduate up to the Journey this time . . .”
“He needs to live, doesn’t he? We can worry about the rest later.”
I wasn’t sure Nadim would feel that way, but Bea was probably right. We had to do something. Anything.
“I’m afraid we’re losing him, Bea.”
Nadim dying meant we died too. Maybe we could get a message off. Maybe someone would hear it. But honestly, neither of us could be sure.
She sank down to a crouch beside me, staring into my face. “Is he still bleeding?”
“No, the wound’s clotted. I think this is just his . . . condition. He can’t wake up.”
“What about installing that device you built?”
I’d thought about that, but there were no instructions, not in the assembly room, not in the console. That, presumably, was information that would have gotten loaded later, before he went on the Journey.
Nadim had told me that he didn’t need it on the Tour because he stuck to the approved routes. That he didn’t take risks. So what had he done wrong?
Before he’d fallen asleep, he’d bonded with me. I couldn’t shake the knowledge that this was because of me.
“We’ll activate the distress signal,” she suggested. “Maybe one of the other Leviathan will answer it.”
Neither of us liked it, but there were no more options that either of us could find. We were probably ending Nadim’s chance for the Journey; from what Nadim had told me, that might mean he’d be sent off, alone and exiled. We’d lose him. He’d lose us.
But at least he’d be alive.
And alone, I told myself. He doesn’t want to live that way.
I didn’t either, now that I understood how it felt to be a part of something bigger.
With clumsy hands, I fiddled with the console. I missed voice activation via Nadim. Hell, I just missed Nadim. How long has he been out, now?
“There may not be anyone in range,” Bea said. “By the time our message reaches them, real-time, Nadim might have gotten the starlight he needs or—”
“There is no ‘or.’” My entire body tightened just thinking about it. Past that point, we’d lose power to these machines. Nadim wouldn’t be manufacturing breathable air for us or keeping us warm. Long after we suffocated or froze, Nadim would die.
“Okay.” Her tone was gentle, like she was a doctor about to deliver bad news.
I didn’t want to imagine any scenario where Nadim was dying or dead. Luck used to be my nemesis, but things had shifted in my favor lately, so why not roll the dice
again? I didn’t wait for Bea to locate any emergency procedures buried in Nadim’s records, so while she scrolled and sorted, I activated communications and recorded a message that would loop, short and to the point. “Our Leviathan is injured. Requesting immediate support. Please advise.”
Then I beamed it out wide into space.
“Zara! What if someone else hears that?”
“You mean, other aliens? I don’t care, as long as they know how to wake a Leviathan. I’m on first watch, monitoring Nadim and listening for a response.”
“But—there must be a reason that the Leviathan didn’t tell us about any other ships, other races—”
“Maybe,” I said, and met her eyes. “It’s all we’ve got, Bea.”
She didn’t ask me to promise that we’d be okay. At that moment, I didn’t have it in me to reassure her. Not with Nadim checked out and the memory of his former Honors screaming in my head. Bea kept me company, not talking much, just being there. I remembered long nights in the Zone, huddling with my crew for warmth and solidarity against the dark.
Eventually she said, “EMITU sent a message. He says you’d better get down there or he’ll put you to sleep like a bad puppy.”
“You got carried away with his personality profile, you know that, right?”
“Maybe. But he’s not wrong. You need to make sure the treatments are working.”
So I went to med bay. EMITU was sarcastic and ever so slightly concerned about my lack of ability to follow simple directions, but I responded in monosyllables, and eventually, it said that I was good to go after another pain shot. I came back to find Bea sitting quietly. Waiting. Listening to the sound of my message, playing on loop.
“I found the other distress beacon,” she said. “It’s on. Other Leviathan can hear it.”
“Something will break soon. I have faith.”
That was, maybe, the first time I’d ever said anything like that. I’d had no religion to speak of since my childhood, nor reverence, but Nadim had become my pillar of fire in the wilderness. Judging by the look Bea gave me, she thought I was losing my shit. I preferred to think of it as dedication.
