Toxic

by Lydia Kang

  “That’s me, too, isn’t it?” I say. “You made the heritage that I am, gave it a name, made it pretty and docile, something you can take out and look at, then put away for another time.”

  “Hana. Stop it. Help me carry this.”

  “No.”

  “I can’t do this alone. I’ve already given up so much. I was court-martialed when I woke up, and I stole a craft to come to get you. Because they weren’t going to bother. They assumed you’d probably already died, like the rest of the Selkirk crew were destined to die.”

  I can’t fight her anymore. She’s my mother, and even if she’s made mistakes, I cannot bear to see her pant and struggle with that damned box. But I’m tired, too. I grasp the other end of the box, and we stumble along.

  Mother’s face is grim, and her lips press into a focused, straight line, nothing like the soft-spoken and gentle mother I remember from before. She runs through the hallways with far more surety than I ever have. After all, she’s not been confined in a single room most her life.

  As we haul the box, she mutters things under her breath, marveling at the rapid decline of Cyclo. Things like “exponential decay” and “erratic apoptosis” and “cellular rationing.”

  Between heavy breaths, I ask, “Where will we go?”

  “Anywhere but here. I have a few options within the fuel reserves of the ship. Hana, Cyclo’s full destruction and meltdown are imminent. I only have two suits on the ship, so we can’t risk irreversible radiation toxicity.” She adds with hesitancy, “I didn’t expect anyone would be alive, let alone two of you.”

  Neither did we.

  We finally get there. Fenn is standing by the ship, eyeing it warily. He looks exhausted and, I’m noticing for the first time in a while, he doesn’t look like his usual confident self. Just a boy who’s wondering if he has a future. As soon as he sees me, his eyes light up with relief and life. I drop my end of the box, and the weight causes Mother to drop hers. It cracks as it makes contact with Cyclo’s floor, no longer cushiony like it was when it was healthy. I run to Fenn, my embrace nearly knocking him off his feet.

  “I thought I’d never see you again,” he whispers.

  “Me, too.” I loosen my embrace just enough to kiss him, and Fenn kisses me right back. When we pull away, we’ve briefly forgotten that we are not alone.

  Mother’s face is blank. “You have got to be kidding me.”

  “Never mind. We’ll explain later. Let’s get out of here,” I say.

  She waits for me to enter the ship; the order of entry isn’t lost on me. This time, I’ll leave Cyclo before Mother. As I step into the new ship, my hand touches the silvery outside, but it’s warm—blood-warm. I withdraw my hand quickly as if stung.

  “It’s a bioship, like Cyclo. Amorfovita potentia subtiliter. A much younger and better-designed species. Don’t worry, Sannu is very compliant,” Mother says.

  Sannu. What a pretty name for a ship. I taste the words in my mouth before I decide to say them.

  “Compliant. Young. Like how Cyclo was,” I say.

  “Yes, but better. Come. I already said we don’t have time for this.”

  I step onto the ship, but the insides are hard, and whitish silver. Sannu’s endoskeleton is different than Cyclo’s, and there is no matrix here. I wonder if the outside matrix somehow can withstand the brutality of outer space, or if it withdraws into pores embedded into the ship. Mother points out the silver suit attached to the inner frame of the craft. “Put this on, Hana. I’ve only one other, so I’m sorry, Fenn. You’ll have to cross your fingers that we have no breaches on our trip.”

  “Of course.” Fenn’s voice is hollow. He sits down on the seat in the rear of the craft that Mother’s pointed out, but doesn’t buckle himself in. He’s fingering the pendant around his neck, staring out one of the portholes to the left.

  I watch him, watch the light from Sannu reflect on the pendant between his fingers.

  “Wait. I need a knife,” I say.

  Mother and Fenn both turn to me to say, simultaneously, “What?”

  “For his biomonitor. We have to remove it and leave it on Cyclo, or he won’t fulfill his contract.”

  “Forget the contract!” Mother says.

  “It’s okay, Hana,” Fenn says, but he looks so defeated. Like he doesn’t care.

  “No. ReCOR has to think he died on the ship. You’ve done so much work. Maybe enough to fulfill your contract.” I march up to Mother and put out my hand. “I know you’ve got a knife on your suit. I saw it.”

  “At least let me do it,” Mother says. I nod, and she pulls out a small blade from a sheath on her calf. “Where is it?”

  “Uh, in my neck.” Fenn points at a place just above his clavicle. Mother feels the mobile metal implant with her fingertips.

  “We don’t have time for anesthetics.” She raises the tip of her knife. “This is going to hurt.”

  “Great. Please don’t hit my artery.”

  I watch as she slips the tip of her knife against his skin. Bright red blood blooms against the blade and dribbles down his neck. Fenn grimaces and grips the armrests. Mother is digging into his flesh with the tip of her knife, and something metallic flicks out of his wound, leaving a red mark where it bounces against the floor.

  She grabs the tiny silver transmitter and exits Sannu to fling it far down into the corridor within Cyclo. Fenn holds his hand against his bleeding cut.

  The ship hums a little, almost like a whale’s song underwater.

  “Sannu wants to leave,” Mother says. “I’ll get the box, and we’ll prep for launch.”

  Suddenly, the entire floor lurches a full forty-five degrees.

  “Hana!” Mother yells, as she falls to the ground and slides into the corridor wall about twenty feet away. Fenn and I are flung hard to Sannu’s floor, and Fenn grunts as his cheekbone collides with an edge of Sannu’s main door. I only get a grip on the door’s edge, and my feet kick helplessly sideways. The ship is continuing to tilt.

  “Cyclo’s stopped rotating. The gravity on the ship is gone,” Fenn yells. His cheek is cut, but the blood clings to his face weirdly, and I see a tiny globule of blood gliding away from him after the impact. A tiny, free-floating sphere of ruby red.

  I kick to get my feet to the ground, or the wall, or whatever is down now, but it doesn’t work. I look up at Fenn, whose face is white with fear, streaked with red. But he’s right. I look at him and realize he’s floating ever so slightly. I pull gently on the edge of the door and float awkwardly into Sannu.

  “The box!” Mother yells. “I have to get it!” She launches herself off the wall and toward the box, which has gone tumbling in zero gravity, and its contents are now floating every which way. A tiny, baby-size hanbok in vivid red and yellow, which I wore when I turned a year old, glides by just out of reach.

  “Forget it! We have to go!” I yell.

  Sannu speaks, a shock to hear its voice so soothing and unlike Cyclo’s.

  “Radiation levels are rising. The ship is burning up internally.” How utterly calm and inappropriate.

  Mother looks longingly at the box and her priceless family heirlooms before cursing. She pushes herself from the closest wall and floats erratically toward the open door of the ship. Fenn shoots out a long arm and grabs Mother’s forearm, and he swings her inside Sannu.

  “Close doors, prepare for launch,” Mother orders Sannu, who complies immediately with shutting the door. I use my hands to guide myself to the nearest seat next to Mother’s in the cockpit. We all fumble with the harnesses to get ourselves buckled in.

  “Sannu, release your matrix from the docking area.”

  “Releasing,” Sannu says.

  “Reverse thrusters, fifteen percent.”

  The whole ship lurches yet again, and my skull bangs hard against the headrest of my seat. In front of us, the
cockpit window shows reddish flames licking at the far corridor. I muffle a cry at the sight of Cyclo on fire from the inside out.

  “Radiation levels are critical,” Sannu says.

  “I know,” Mother snaps.

  There is a large cracking noise, so loud and strong that the whole ship reverberates and my teeth clack against each other.

  “What is that?” Fenn says. He’s forgotten about his wounds—the blood has slowed to a tiny trickle, leaving a crimson stain on his neck and cheek.

  “It’s Sannu detaching. There are sometimes cracks that occur in his endoskeleton, and Cyclo’s, as part of the separation process.”

  Neither Fenn nor I ever knew what it was like to exit a biological craft, and it’s awful. It’s like breaking bones and tearing flesh, and my eyes well over at the pain that both must be feeling. Despite what Cyclo has done, my heart is breaking for her. She’s dying.

  Oh God, she’s dying. And I didn’t even get a chance to say goodbye.

  After one last, long creak, Sannu detaches, and there is a gap of a few feet between us and Cyclo. The creaking stops immediately, and there is the blessed, horrid silence of being in space, apart from the apocalypse happening on Cyclo.

  I stifle a cry.

  And Mother moans.

  I look at her, where she has her hands on the controls, and she’s leaning over, eyes squeezed tightly closed.

  “Mother? What’s the matter?”

  “I don’t know. Oh, God. Everything hurts.”

  “What’s happening?” Fenn yells from the back.

  “It’s Mother. Something’s wrong. She’s—”

  Mother’s face goes ashen, and her hands drop from the controls. “Hana. I’m…”

  She can’t even finish her sentence. She starts clawing at her arm beneath her suit. She grabs her forearm, exactly where her Cyclo tattoo is, and throws her head back and screams.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  FENN

  Dr. Um is screaming, screaming, screaming.

  “God, what is it?” Hana asks. She unhooks her buckles and straps to push herself over to her mother.

  “Hana, don’t!” I yell.

  “It’s the Cyclo tissue in me. It’s dying, too,” Dr. Um says, gasping between her moans. “Oh, God. It’s not like—I can’t—I didn’t think—”

  “We have to take her suit off,” Hana says, releasing her mother from her seat and tugging at the thick, white fabric, finding the fasteners that go to her arm and yanking the whole sleeve off.

  “We are on manual control,” Sannu says. “Would you like me to autopilot a safe distance away from the Calathus?”

  “YES!” Hana and I yell simultaneously. The ship backs farther away from Cyclo, not fast enough for my taste, but there are other things to deal with. I unbuckle and push myself over to Dr. Um’s chair.

  Hana has removed the sleeve of her suit, where it goes lithely floating away. She tears at the skin-tight fabric of her clothes, ripping up the sleeve in one smooth movement. When Hana sees her mother’s arm, she cries out.

  This is not good.

  I’d expected the tattoo to be blue, or at least navy blue. A pretty lotus design.

  But all I see is blood and black gashes deep in her arm. The darkness is rapidly spreading, sending itself through the veins under her skin, even as we speak.

  And to make matters worse, the ship has stopped moving.

  “Make a tourniquet, Hana. Anything to stop the spread. Cyclo’s cells must be dying in her arm, too. But maybe we can keep it from hurting the rest of her,” I say. Hana uses the torn shirt to tourniquet her mother’s arm. I yell, “Sannu! Why isn’t this ship moving faster?”

  “We are still attached to the Calathus,” Sannu tells us placidly.

  “What?” Hana and I yell again, simultaneously.

  “The Calathus has sent out a pseudopod and has reattached to my hull. I am trying to break the bond, but she is highly radioactive and I’m having trouble—she is permutating my cells—she is trying to override my controls.”

  Hana looks at her mother, then out the cockpit window. We are getting closer to Cyclo, not farther away.

  No, no, no.

  Hana looks at me, a sickened expression over her face.

  “She wants me,” Hana says, quietly.

  “Hana, let Sannu break the connection. There’s nothing you can do!” her mother yells between gasps of pain.

  Hana doesn’t listen. She’s staring back through the cockpit window, looking at a thick cord of matrix that’s stretched out to our little ship. Stretched out to take Hana back. Behind, we can see licks of flames and explosions happening inside the plastrix windows all around the edges of Cyclo. The ship has tilted, and as we’re attached, we have, too, no longer with the shining blue of Maia above us.

  “Radiation levels are critical,” Sannu repeats.

  “She wants me,” Hana says again, like she’s in a trance. “Only me.”

  I undo the buckles of my safety belts, but I’m not fast enough. Hana pushes herself back toward the door and touches the walls with her hands as she presses her body against the membrane of Sannu’s wall.

  “Sannu. Dr. Um is incapacitated. I need you to release me from the ship. It’s the only way you’ll get away from the Calathus.”

  “You need a passcode for authorization,” Sannu says.

  Mother cries out, “No, Hana!”

  “Dal a, dal a,” Hana says.

  “Hana!” Mother cries out. She tries to unbuckle herself, but she crumples in a howl of pain. “Stop! Sannu, don’t—”

  “Authorization accepted,” Sannu says.

  “I need to leave the ship,” Hana says.

  “Sannu, override authorization,” Dr. Um gasps, but Sannu flashes a kindly yellow color.

  “My biomonitors read that you are incapacitated, Dr. Um. Authorization has already been accepted.”

  Dr. Um points to the wall. “But the suit! God, Hana, at least put on one of the pressurized suits!”

  “Two suits. One for you, and one for Mother. Take care of her, Fenn. I know you’ll figure out a way to keep her alive.”

  With the buckles on my harnesses all free, I launch myself toward Hana. Hana spreads her palms against Sannu’s inner skin. He seems to know exactly what she’s asking for, without her saying a word. He’s even more responsive that Cyclo. A thin film envelops Hana, separating her from the cockpit. The film grows an inch thick by the time I reach her. I realize what’s happening—Sannu is preparing to push Hana right through the wall of the ship and into space. I claw and grab at Sannu’s wall, but it’s thickening even as I gouge out a few bits of matrix here and there. It grows more and more opaque as it gets thicker. Hana already is a blur behind the wall of silvery-white. I can see her mouthing something, but I don’t understand.

  “What is she saying, Sannu?” I yell.

  “Hana is commanding me to fly the ship for at least one hour on autopilot before allowing you or Dr. Um to command me. She has overridden Dr. Um’s command for one hour under all circumstances.”

  “No!” I cry out.

  “She has ordered me to release her outside the ship now.”

  “Sannu, stop her! Stop this!”

  Hana isn’t speaking anymore. She simply smiles in the blurry cloud behind the wall of Sannu’s making. She raises her hand against the wall between us. All I can do is put my hand near hers in pantomime. Tears are streaming down my face.

  “Don’t do this. Don’t, Hana. Don’t,” I say, over and over again.

  Soon, I can’t see her anymore as the wall goes completely opaque.

  Hana is gone.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  HANA

  The outer membrane spreads thinly, and I am pushed out into the freezing, airless emptiness of space. This is what I had to do, s
o that Cyclo would let Fenn and Mother live. Sometimes, you have to give things away to get what you really want.

  I can’t breathe. Already, the moisture over my eyeballs boils off, and my eyes begin to freeze. Without the pressurization on Sannu or Cyclo, my body feels like it’s being pulled in multiple directions, expanding, though my skin won’t let it. I can’t move well, but the force of leaving Sannu has launched me gently toward Cyclo. I feel the saliva in my mouth evaporate away.

  I start counting down, knowing I only have perhaps ten or fifteen more seconds before I lose consciousness.

  Through the blurriness of my vision, I can vaguely see Cyclo’s hold on Sannu break away. Sannu drifts further and accelerates in reverse, putting a comfortable distance between it and Cyclo. I would sigh with relief if I could. Instead, the peninsula of blue tissue reaches for me and breaks off completely from Cyclo. The blob of Cyclo is soft and gel-like, and it freezes with a pattern of beautiful crystals. As it moves and undulates toward me, the crystals shatter and reform, an exquisite dance of dying cells and temperature mechanics.

  This last piece of Cyclo must be the only part of her that has survived. The rest of the ship is a ball of fire, combustion, radiation, and poisonous gas. Soon, it will burn itself out and be nothing but a mass of darkness that will find the pull of a willing planetary body or star, and either enter an orbit or crash into oblivion.

  The blue sphere of Cyclo’s last functioning tissue comes closer to me. I’ll die if I stay in space for another minute. Already, the oxygen and nitrogen and carbon dioxide dissolved in my blood are finding each other, clinging to each other, becoming gas again. The pain of it is excruciating, as bubbles form in my joints, my brain, my blood vessels. I’d scream but there is no air to push through my vocal cords. I reach out one hand to the blue sphere, and it touches me. In seconds, it envelops me, and I’m in the cradle of Cyclo’s matrix again, nothing but a girl in a womb of blue.

  I knew, somehow, she would embrace me again.

  Cyclo pressurizes my body, slowly, gently. I am starting to feel better already, but for what? Without the rest of her enormous body, she cannot survive in space much longer, which means I cannot, either.