Aurora Blazing

by Jessie Mihalik

  Ian growled something under his breath, but he was far too pale. Aoife pulled the gate open, setting off a screeching alarm. She took in my heels with a glance. “Can you keep up?”

  I could run in these heels, but not for long. “How far is the ship?”

  “Over a kilometer. The dark will help, but we need to move.” She assessed Ian with another probing glance. “I can’t put him over my shoulder with a stomach wound like that, so I won’t be able to shoot. It’s up to you.”

  I took off the half mask I still wore. I needed to see as well as possible. I tried to take Ian’s blast pistol but he clung to it tenaciously. “I’m not that helpless,” he grumbled.

  Aoife took off and within three steps I knew I wouldn’t be able to keep up with my shoes on. I kicked the heels off and took flight barefoot. The pockmarked pavement was littered with debris that stabbed the tender soles of my feet.

  The world narrowed to running and pain. The cuff pulsed as it repelled three quick shots. Ian shot over my head and a distant scream indicated a hit. My feet were on fire, sending lightning bolts of pain up my legs, but I blocked it out as best I could.

  I hit one target but didn’t have time to celebrate as another pulse vibrated up my arm. Was that six or seven? Somewhere I’d lost count, but either way, the cuff was nearly out of power.

  Fatigue dragged at me and the air burned through my lungs. A side stitch felt like someone had stabbed me between the ribs and still we ran. When the ship came into view, the relief nearly put me on the ground.

  Unfortunately, we weren’t the only ones interested in the ship. A hail of blaster bolts greeted our approach and the cuff vibrated once, twice, then died. Pain, bright and familiar, tore through my right leg.

  I stumbled, my body numb, but a hulking figure in combat armor scooped me up and ran for the ship. I clung to consciousness by the merest thread. I had to know if Ian was okay.

  The bright lights of the cargo bay blinded me and I blinked the stars out of my eyes.

  “Fortuitous, take us into orbit,” Aoife demanded. The ship chimed an acknowledgment. “Alex, drop her in the medbay then go to the flight deck and get us hidden.”

  “Ian first,” I mumbled as Alexander slid me onto the medbay diagnostic table. “I’ll be okay for a while.” My nanobots might be a huge pain in my ass 99 percent of the time, but even working slower than most, they wouldn’t let me bleed to death from a blaster wound. Probably.

  I grabbed weakly at Alexander’s armored arm before he could move away. “Thank you,” I said.

  He inclined his helmeted head and disappeared. I blinked and Aoife’s face appeared above mine. She’d stripped out of at least the top half of her combat armor. She reached for the diagnostic console.

  “Ian first,” I repeated.

  “Funny, he said the same thing about you. But since there are two diagnostic tables on this ship, neither of you gets to make a noble sacrifice.”

  “He’s been bleeding for far longer. Patch him up first,” I whispered.

  Something softened in Aoife’s expression and she nodded wordlessly.

  I drifted in a haze of pain, listening to Ian’s grumbles and Aoife’s gruff bedside manner. I hurt from head to toe—literally—and did my best to lie completely still.

  “Your turn, princess,” Aoife said. She pressed an injector to my arm and pulled the trigger. “That’ll take a while to hit, but your nanos have already started on your feet, so the diagnostic recommends digging out the debris as soon as possible. Can you stand it?”

  I could’ve told her that my nanos wouldn’t make much progress in five minutes, but that would just lead to more questions, so I took a deep breath and nodded. Pain and I were well acquainted.

  She grabbed my left ankle and began poking and prodding the bottom of my foot. I locked my knee straight and gritted my teeth. Agony flared in waves as she removed tiny pieces of glass and metal. After a few minutes, I couldn’t stop the tears, so I stared at the ceiling and let them roll silently into my hair.

  The cool sting of an antiseptic wash was nearly a relief. Aoife slathered the sole of my foot in regeneration gel, though the wounds weren’t deep enough to really need it, and wrapped my whole foot in bandages. “One down, one to go,” she said. “You okay?”

  I didn’t trust myself to speak, so I merely nodded again. Her sympathetic face appeared in my view. “You’re doing well,” she said. “The painkiller should kick in any minute.”

  This leg was far worse because every time she moved my foot, the wound on my thigh sent slivers of pain straight up my spine. I kept still only through long practice and held breaths. When she hit a particularly deep piece of something, a tiny whimper broke through my control. I froze for a second before I remembered where I was.

  “Stay down,” Aoife commanded and I frowned at the ceiling because I hadn’t moved.

  Ian groaned and I rolled my head toward the sound, only to find him sitting on the edge of the second diagnostic table. His shirt was missing and his torso was wrapped in white bandages. “What are you doing?” I demanded. “Lie down before you hurt yourself worse!”

  His eyes met mine. “I’m fine. Aoife patched me up.”

  Of all the stubborn men in the world, I had to get stuck with this one. “Ian Bishop, if you do not lie back down on that table, I’m going to come over there and make you. And I still have glass in my feet and a hole in my thigh.”

  He didn’t move, so I sat up with a groan. The edges of my vision darkened, but I fought through it.

  Aoife kept a hand clamped around my ankle. She grumbled something under her breath that caused Ian to flash a look at me, but all I could hear was the blood rushing through my ears. I was dangerously close to passing out.

  I decided that consciousness was the better part of valor, so I wilted back to the table. I was so busy not passing out that I barely noticed Aoife bandaging my foot.

  “The only other thing the diagnostic tagged was your thigh. Is that right? Are you hurt anywhere else?” she asked.

  “Just my thigh.”

  “Looks like the bolt went through clean, so I just need to irrigate it and coat it in gel and you’ll be good as new in no time.”

  My left foot was already starting to burn as the regeneration gel did its thing. My thigh would be far worse. I briefly considered asking for stronger pain meds, but without whatever specialized blend Gregory used to use, it wouldn’t do much. Somehow, he’d tweaked my nanos to counteract painkillers. If I was a less charitable person, I’d say he did it on purpose because he was a sadistic bastard.

  Wait, I was a less charitable person.

  “Is it okay if I cut your dress?” Aoife asked.

  The dress was soaked in Ian’s blood. I wouldn’t be wearing it again, no matter how much I liked it. When I nodded, she slit the fabric up to my waist.

  “This may sting,” she warned. The antiseptic wash did sting, but it was so mild when compared to my feet that it practically felt good. She probed the wound, checked the diagnostic scan, and then grimaced at me. “The gel needs to fill the wound, so brace yourself.”

  With that she pressed a thick syringe of regeneration gel to the wound opening on the front of my thigh and depressed the plunger. Now that stung. I blinked away tears as she wrapped a snug, waterproof bandage around my leg.

  Both feet now felt like I’d propped them far too close to an open flame. Little tingles of pain shot up my nerves, making it difficult to hold still. But the second I moved, the pain tripled. In another minute or two, my thigh wound would burn like the sun.

  I tried to speak but my voice came out in a pained hiss. I cleared my throat and tried again. “Would you mind asking Alexander if he could carry me to my quarters? I hate to bother him, but I don’t think I can walk.”

  “You’re not going anywhere,” Ian said. “Not until you’re healed.”

  “Lie down,” Aoife said, her tone half exasperation, half command.

  “Do not remove Lady Bianca from
the medbay until she is healed,” he demanded.

  “Please, Aoife,” I begged softly. I was going to break under the pain and I didn’t want an audience.

  “Ian’s right,” she said at last. “You should stay here in case there are complications. But I’ll move you behind a privacy screen.”

  Hysterical laughter tried to rise, but I shoved it down. Without a silencer to hide behind, I would just have to endure the agony. The next few hours would feel like an interminable hell.

  With a button press, the diagnostic table rose a couple of centimeters and Aoife slid it into the little private nook along the wall. She drew the curtain and draped a blanket over me. The blanket’s pressure on my feet sent sparks of pain lancing up my legs, but I just clenched my jaw and ignored it.

  She paused and peered at my face. “You’re still in pain. The painkiller should’ve kicked in by now.”

  “I’m slightly resistant, but I’m fine,” I said.

  “Do you want me to try something else?”

  “No,” I bit out. I closed my eyes. That was rude, but the pain in my thigh had begun to climb. “Thank you for your help. I am fine. Please leave.”

  I winced again because that hadn’t exactly been polite, either, but it was all I could do to lie still and not scream.

  “The table will keep an eye on your vitals, but call me if you need anything,” she said.

  “Thank you.”

  She nodded and blessedly disappeared behind the curtain. I heard her murmuring to Ian, but I couldn’t make out the words.

  Seconds trudged into minutes and sweat broke out along my forehead as my lower body was engulfed in fiery pain. I counted the ceiling tiles, the eyelets on the curtain, and finally, when the pain became overwhelming, the breaths drawn through clenched teeth.

  The curtain’s sudden disappearance distracted me and another mortifying whimper slipped past my control.

  Ian stood hunched next to me, his eyes silently scanning me from head to toe. I had little hope that he’d missed my clenched fists, sweating brow, and taut frame. He proved me right by asking, “What’s wrong?”

  I unclamped my jaw. “You should not be walking around,” I whispered, avoiding the question.

  “You shouldn’t be in pain,” he countered. “Didn’t Aoife give you an anesthetic?”

  “She did. I’m resistant. Please leave.” The words were gritted out between breaths. Focusing on the conversation meant I had less focus dedicated to ignoring the pain and it bloomed around me in cascading waves.

  “Your feet will heal quickly, but the hole in your thigh will take at least half a day. You can’t stay in pain that long. Do you know of any painkillers that work?”

  “Some do, but I don’t know which,” I said, wishing he would go away so I could suffer in peace.

  “Do you trust me?”

  I glanced at him. “In what way?”

  He grimaced, and I realized that question had likely been answer enough. “I don’t need pain meds often,” he said, “but when I do, I use a special blend.” His lifted eyebrow asked if I caught the meaning. I nodded. He wasn’t going to admit to being a member of the Genesis Project outright, but he was strongly hinting in that direction. “It might work for you. I could give you a quarter dose and see.”

  I tried to weigh the pros and cons, but the pain made thinking difficult. “Try it,” I conceded at last. Anything had to be better than this.

  Ian disappeared for so long that I figured he wouldn’t return. I decided I’d had enough. I wasn’t going to stay here like a bug under a microscope. My brother had been sold to MineCorp and I needed to find him before the job killed him. If I could make it back to the privacy of my quarters, I could start searching for information.

  Sitting up took an age and jostled my leg enough that I thought I’d pass out, but I made it. I waved away the diagnostic table’s alarm and hoped Aoife hadn’t been paying attention.

  Moving a centimeter at a time, I slid my legs over the side of the table. Now for the tricky bit. I needed to slowly slide off the table so I didn’t land too hard on my injured feet. Unfortunately, my arms trembled as much as the rest of my body.

  Before I’d worked up the courage for the drop, the medbay door slid open and Ian staggered inside, followed carefully by Aoife. She didn’t look at all surprised to see me trying to slip off the table. “You two are going to be the death of me,” she griped. “This one takes a walk with a hole in his gut and you decide to stand with a hole through your leg. You are perfect for each other.”

  “I told you, I’m fine,” Ian said. “I’ve had worse than this.” He crossed the room and pressed an injector into my hand. “It’s set for a quarter dose,” he said quietly.

  “Thank you,” I whispered. I pressed the injector against my exposed thigh and pulled the trigger.

  “Yes,” Aoife said, still arguing, “but you seem to forget that you’re not in some godforsaken hellhole where you have to keep going or die. Fortuitous has an excellent medbay that would get you up and going faster, if you would just stay put.” She jabbed a finger at me. “And you, what’s your excuse?”

  “I’m going to my quarters.”

  She huffed out an irritated breath. “And how are you going to get there? Crawl?”

  “If I have to,” I said calmly.

  Her eyes widened, then narrowed. “Think you can?”

  “If I have to,” I repeated.

  She threw her hands up. “You’re as bad as Ian, but I’ve got news for you both: you’re staying here until you’re healed. If you want out faster, I’ll put you in the tank.”

  That caught my attention. “Fortuitous has a regeneration tank? Why didn’t you start with it?” I’d thought the ship too small for a regen tank, but the double diagnostic tables should’ve been a giveaway that this ship didn’t have the standard medbay configuration.

  “Most people avoid the tank if they can,” she said. “Your wounds weren’t bad enough to require it, though Ian was close.”

  Regeneration gel healed even deep wounds and had the added benefit of mobility while healing. It burned like a bitch, but most people could dose up on painkillers and be fine. Regeneration tanks were reserved for critical wounds that needed intense healing. The tanks were faster than gel, but kept the patient tied to one location. They also fucking hurt and even good meds couldn’t block all the pain.

  “Put me in the tank for an hour. Unless Ian has opened his wound and needs it more.”

  “You could share,” Aoife suggested with a smirk. “Then I wouldn’t have to worry about chasing either of you all over the ship.”

  Sharing wasn’t unheard of, but it was usually reserved for emergencies. Depending on the size, tanks could accommodate one to four people because someone had done the math and figured that it became inefficient after four. Large military ships had dozens of tanks.

  Sharing a tank could be considered intimate because of the lack of clothes, but I’d lost my modesty years ago. And with the hole in my leg, I’d be in too much pain for anything fun, anyway.

  “I don’t mind if he doesn’t,” I finally said.

  Ian’s head snapped toward me, his expression unreadable.

  I shrugged at him. “Up to you.”

  “An hour,” he allowed. “And I want a full report on MineCorp ready when I get out. If you need to jump before then, jump us back to Andromeda Prime.”

  Aoife hummed something under her breath, but she went to the control panel on the far wall and tapped the screen.

  “I don’t want full immersion,” I clarified. “I’ll sit.” Depending on the injury, the patient could sit or float in the tank. Floating required a breathing mask, so I avoided it when I could.

  “You sure about this?” Ian asked.

  “Could you be more specific?”

  “Sharing.”

  I grinned at him. “Are you worried for your virtue? I promise I won’t take advantage.”

  His expression heated and the corner of his
mouth tipped up. “I was less concerned about my virtue than yours.”

  “Oh, are you planning to ravish me in the regen tank while your gut wound heals? You are an overachiever, Ian Bishop,” I teased. “But sadly for you, now that I know about your plan, I can take preventive measures.”

  A pleasant, warm numbness had dulled the sharp edge of my pain and I sighed in relief. It might not block the tank pain, but even a moment’s relief was paradise right now.

  “Is it working?” Ian asked. He watched my face closely.

  “Yes . . . is something wrong?”

  Ian shook his head. He really was unbelievably handsome. Had I thought his eyes icy? Today they were the warm blue of a cloudless morning sky. I touched his cheek, running gentle fingers over the bruise forming on his jaw before my gaze snagged on his mouth. I slid my fingers to the back of his head, into the soft waves of his hair and pulled him toward me.

  He resisted and clarity briefly reasserted itself. I jerked my hand back. “Ian, did you give me a shot of foxy?”

  “Foxy is included in the mix, yes,” he said. “That’s why I gave you such a low dose. I didn’t expect it to affect you so strongly.”

  While foxy generally helped with focus and pain tolerance, it also had a well-known side effect as an aphrodisiac. Something about lowered inhibitions and feeling invincible made people excited. It’s one of the reasons it was so popular as a street drug.

  I’d used foxy before—professionally. The first time I’d needed it was during one of my very first solo missions. Things did not go according to plan. I’d barely dragged myself out for backup to find me. I’d used it a few times since then and I had never reacted to it like this. Of course, I hadn’t used it in the past four years. This was yet another thing that Gregory’s tinkering had broken.

  Still, the warmth floating through my veins was nice. “Perhaps you should be worried for your virtue after all, Director Bishop,” I said, using his title to remind myself of why that would be a bad, bad idea.

  “I trust you, Lady Bianca,” he said gravely, but his eyes laughed at me.