by Aline Riva
He took hold of her hand and kissed it.
"I feel fine!"
Then the look in his eyes changed as he felt touched by deep warmth and a flow of emotion that had been so hard to catch before – it was all he had wanted to restore since Cora's death. If he had thought perhaps he loved Sin before, he knew now that he did, and deeply...
"I'm sorry I tried to trick you into killing Harvey and Janey. I want you to know all that stuff about slicing you up never would have happened. It never will, do you believe me? I love you! And we'll talk to Jody about another way to fix the problem with the zestion. There must be something it reacts to, something that makes the fibres stop spreading. Sometimes I do things and I don't think, it just takes me over..."
"Which is why I think there is a physical cause."
Jinx ran his fingers through his hair, looking away as he wished she would stop talking about a theory that terrified him.
"Jinx," Sin said gently, "You said when you were trapped on the planet you all had a craving for human flesh. You all tried it and became addicted to it. I've been forced to eat – it disgusted me. I never want to touch it again. Don't you see? There's so much more going on here."
Jinx felt a flicker of fear as something clashed in his mind, between reason and the beckoning darkness.
"I sometimes dream I'm being eaten from the inside, by this swirling mass of pitch dark space. Like it's eating up my mind. I've never told anyone that before."
"Does anyone else have strange dreams?"
"Cora used to get nightmares about something crawling inside her head. Mack doesn't sleep too well...neither does Jody. Zeke can go days without sleep, he hates sleeping..." Jinx looked at her, his eyes wide as he realised something that had seemed insignificant suddenly mattered, and in a terrible way...
"Come with me!" he said urgently, grabbing her hand and hurrying up the walkway, heading for the control room.
"What are you doing?" she asked as they reached the door and he opened it impatiently.
Jinx had hurried over to the controls and started to rattle off command codes, ignoring her as she asked again, keeping his sights set on the screen in front of him.
"Rik?"
He was looking down at the screen as he entered a final code.
"Initiate sweep, entire ship... identify alien organism."
"Rik!" she said again.
He glanced up at her as section by section, a map of the ship was illuminated.
"I've asked the ship's main security device to sweep the entire vessel and search for anything non human – including viruses and parasites."
Then he looked back at the screen, watching as the entire map of the ship was covered. For a moment the sweep continued, then as two locations were circled, Jinx stared at the screen.
"No way..."
"What have you found?" Sin asked as she stepped closer.
Jinx indicated to the two areas where a red circle homed in – the med bay and the control room...
"I'm in the control area and Jody is in the med bay... let's get some more..."
He touched the screen requesting sharp focus, then isolate and identify. Then he and Sin watched as the screen shot closer, magnifying again and again, in a series of flashes until it had caught an image, a vastly magnified image that they both stared at as Jinx paled and broke into a sweat.
"That's inside my head," he whispered, stunned by the sight of the magnified brain tissue and the long, thin, worm-like creature that rested within. Suddenly it writhed, and he jumped back away from the screen, clutching at his head as panic, then he let go, realising he had felt nothing as he saw the movement on the screen.
"Identify life form," he said in a hushed voice.
"Unknown," replied the computerised system, "Alien origin – unidentified."
Sin had never seen Jinx look terrified before. She had seen fear and regret and pain and madness reflected in his gaze, but nothing like this.
"What is it?" he yelled, smashing his fist into the screen and fracturing the glass.
"Unidentified," the system replied again.
"I'm sorry I was right," Sin told him, "Now we have to tell the others."
"No."
Jinx turned off the screen, then rubbed at the side of his head as he wished he could just grab that thing and rip it out... everything Sin had told him made horrible sense now...
"I can't tell them," he added, "Not yet....they don't know and they don't need to know until we work out how to get rid of it."
"This also means you're not crazy," she reminded him, "Those urges you get – the savage feelings, the instinct to kill, the cannibalism – it's not you, it's that thing that's got inside your head. It's controlling your mind and the minds of the others, they are all infected."
"But you're not?"
"No, because I wasn't on the Pharaoh. You can't make me turn like you, I don't have the parasite. What can the system tell us about the planet where you were stranded?"
He looked down at the controls, exited the menu and brought up another, the screen blurred beneath its cracked surface and then activated once more. His hands shook as he keyed in the request and hit an option on the screen.
" S69Q-1 is uninhabited... Wait... "
"What have you found?" Sin asked, but the door opened and Jody entered the room.
Jinx looked up from the screen. He was pale and perspiring, his eyes wide, a look of alarm on his face.
"Is something wrong?" Jody asked.
He turned off the screen.
"No, no... have you given the passengers their shots yet?"
"I'm just about to do it. Did you want to say anything to them before they forget?"
He laughed, wiping away all trace of the shock she had seen on his face as she entered the room.
"What would be the point? Go and wipe their minds, I want to get this bird in the air!"
"Okay," Jody replied, then she left the control room.
As the door closed Jinx turned back to Sin, a look of urgency in his eyes once more.
"I want Jody off the ship before we leave."
"Why?" she asked.
"Because you have a piece of zestion that needs removing before it kills you and I have a monster inside my head making me become a monster! We both need something taken out and Jody is not the person do it for either of us! I'm going to leave Shyra-K1."
She stared at him in disbelief.
"Leave? You have a parasite inside you that encourages you to kill, eat human flesh and do all kinds of crazy to innocent people, you can't be trusted out there!"
There was a battle going on inside his mind as he found his answer.
"When I thought it was just us surviving, I thought the way I'd become was like a mental scar. I thought it was me, all me doing this but it's not! Now I know, I can feel it trying to take me over. I want it out of my head!"
"But how?" she asked.
"Earth laws regarding alien life are rigid. Before other life forms were discovered on Fespara 46, it was thought the human race was alone in the universe. Now they think Fespara is the only place where we have alien life - a peaceful, simple planet that doesn't need nuking! If they find out about that thing inside me, they'll kill me for being its host. Official channels are not an option, Sin!"
"Oh Jinx, what are you planning now? You don't know if your choices are influenced by the parasite – if you're going to try and cut that thing out yourself, you'll wind up dead! I won't let you do that!"
He blinked, stunned by her suggestion.
"I'm not that stupid! I know a lot of contacts... black market operatives, they can get you anything and provide any service for a fee. I know a surgeon on Karashi out in the Delta belt -"
"Karashi?" she exclaimed, "That's a shit pit of a planet and you don't even know if the surgeon is qualified."
"She fits A grade cyborg implants, will also perform surgery others deem too dangerous to carry out. She might be able to help me - and remove that ring for you
without damaging your body."
"And then what? Assuming the parasite can be removed, assuming you survive, what next?"
"Don't ask me," he said quickly as he keyed in flight preparations and set a course for the nearest colony planet, "Ask him... ask Ritchie Jinx the flier, after he's had the parasite removed and you've shot him with a half dose of Paromycin. I want you to wipe out enough of my memory, so that I forget the crash of the Pharaoh, forget any of this ever happened....A half dose should take out at least fifteen to twenty years of memory."
He paused, shook his head as he wished he could shake out the creature inside it as dark thoughts swirled and he wanted to dance with them.
"I'm not sure I trust myself. Seeing that thing inside me gave me a shock. That threw it off balance but it's all creeping back...Don't let me kill anyone else. Don't let me hurt you."
"Try not to think about it, just get ready to fly this ship."
Jinx went over to the flight controls and sat down and strapped in, reached for the controls and began to start up flight preparation.
"We leave as soon as Jody's off the ship," he told her, then he sucked in a sharp breath as thoughts of blood and slaughter and the taste of flesh played about his mind as he tried to focus on the task of preparing the ship for take off.
As Harvey and Janey sat side by side, he turned his head and looked at her, remembering all the hopes he had held in his heart on the day he had asked her if she would like a trip to the stars.
"When we wake up, we won't remember leaving earth."
"Good," she replied, "I want to forget. I really didn't think we would make it out of there alive, I still can't believe we're going home."
"Sin's not coming with us," he reminded her, "She's made her choice. She's staying with Jinx. I don't think he's going to harm her, as crazy as he is, he loves her."
"She's going to live her life with those maniacs, become just like them."
"And we get to go home," he reminded her, "I do want to tell earth authorities about Shyra-K1, but I've been thinking...if they come after Jinx and the others, they get Sin, too."
"It's better to forget."
Harvey paused.
"By the way, I'm in love with you."
Surprise registered in her eyes.
"You're telling me now, when we're about to forget everything?"
He smiled.
"I'll probably tell you again on the way back to earth."
Then he leaned closer and kissed her.
As the door opened and Jody entered the room, she saw them break from a kiss and held up two pre packaged needles.
"Who wants to go first?" she asked.
Janey and Harvey exchanged a glance.
"I will," Harvey said.
After Harvey and Janey had taken their shots and were sleeping deeply, Jody wished Jinx a safe journey and he smiled, then turned back to the controls.
"I may be gone a while," he told her.
"Why?" Jody asked.
He looked back at her as his eyes lit up.
"I'm going to drag Sin around the galaxy for a while. See how many shit pit planets there are out there..."
He had laughed and Jody had smiled.
"I'll tell Mack and Zeke not to worry... Have fun, Rik."
"I intend to!" Jinx replied with a wicked gleam in his eyes, then he turned back to the controls, waited for Jody to leave the ship and then he sealed the hatch.
"Do you still know what you're doing?" Sin asked as she sat down beside him and closed her belt.
"There's some flight suits back at the armoury area," he replied as the engines fired up, "You might want to change into one of those before we land...but not too soon – I want to enjoy my time with you when we reach the colony planet, after that it's straight to the back end of the galaxy and I'm having this thing taken out of my head. Maybe I'll still be crazy once it's gone, won't that be funny..."
He smiled as he looked at her, but she caught the look of fear in his eyes as his smile faded.
"I used to be scared of space flight," she confessed, "Isn't that funny? Now all I want to do is be up there, out in the dark and heading for the place that gives me hope for both of us. I'm with you all the way, Rik – crazy or sane. Let's just go, you won't be alone no matter what happens."
"Okay, let's get out of here," he said as tension crept into his voice and he looked down at the controls.
The ship fired up and left ground, he took the vessel over treetops, heading skyward, then up, reaching for the place where the stars twinkled in a darkness that reminded him of the side of his mind that was chattering away like a lunatic, giving him thoughts of killing the passengers, having them for dinner and then fucking Sin over their bloody remains...
Jinx kept those thoughts silent, pushing them back as the thought of the parasite in his head gave room for reason to slip in. He had a plan, and he would stick to it:
Drop the passengers on the nearest colonised planet, then head for Karashi and get that thing taken out of his head. He tried not to think about it squirming in his brain as he hit the blackness of space, focusing on the stars as their promise of eternity sent a wave of peace through his mind as he took the ship onward, thankful for the stillness of space and the way it soothed the beast that lived inside his mind.
Jinx plotted the course for the nearest inhabited planet, then set the vessel on auto and sat back, staring into the blackness of space as a fight went on in his head between letting go of reason and holding on to it. He was getting hard at the thought of taking Sin to his bedroom, it was a dark and luxurious place, stocked with fine wines and sex toys and enough restraints to keep her down while he made her cum over and over, dicing with death as the alien metal reacted inside her body...Then he wanted to leave her exhausted and naked on his bed, bound down and ready for more as he drunkenly landed on the colony planet.
But he pulled back from it.
He turned his head and smiled, feeling a strange sense of peace to see Sin had given in to her exhaustion after the rough night in the cage and was now resting in her seat, sleeping deeply. The thought of the thing inside his brain was enough to stave off all it encouraged, it was just enough to push the madness away, enough for him to keep his focus on his plan. As his thoughts settled on what needed to be done, he blocked out the beckon of the insanity that tried to tug at him as he gathered his thoughts, his own voice running through his head as he made his plans:
'I thought it was me, that I'd conquered the odds and learned a new way to survive. We all did the same, we all enjoyed it and we never once thought it was wrong because it felt so right. This is why I need to forget. When this is over, I want to forget everything I ever did, I want a new life with no bad dreams to haunt me and nothing to pull like a dead weight on my conscience. I feel like a light has turned on inside my head and sent that thing scuttling into a corner because I know about it now. It changes so much...But I still want to do those things and it's so hard to hold back. I think of flesh and I feel starving...But I think I can do this. I can hold it together, at least for long enough, until I get to Karashi...There are so many temptations on that planet, I know the darkness will pull at me. I feel sorry for Sin if it wins...'
Then he paused, thinking on another subject: The ship's freezer. Zeke had unloaded the last shipment of frozen bodies, they had enough food to keep them going for a while, but there was still the collection of cut flesh and chilled organs in the ships kitchen...
Leaving the ship on auto, Jinx quietly got up, crept past Sin who was sleeping deeply and left the flight deck, he made his way down a long walkway, cut through a corridor and then reached his personal kitchen area. The fridge was tall and silver and his mouth was watering as he approached it. He opened up the door and reached inside, the hunger growing as he silently promised he would have one last taste, even though he knew he was feeding the thing inside his head, it was demanding that human meat, it was making him crave it...this would be one last meal before everything chang
ed...
He took out all the packaged meat and the bags of organs and carried them to the incinerator, dropped them inside and threw a switch. As it fired up he felt a strange flicker of panic, then he remembered he had saved something special and he ran back to the kitchen, picked up the human heart as blood ran down his fingers as it oozed in his grasp.
As he raised it in both hands and took a bite, he guessed this had to be how an alcoholic felt to take a last drink before going sober. But the taste was so good, the blood revived his senses, blurring his sense of reason as it suddenly made more sense to go into the locked room, kill Harvey and Janey as they slept and then wake Sin and take her hard, putting his needs first and urgently, before toying with that alien metal between her legs and making her scream in pain and pleasure, even if it killed her she would die happy...
He swallowed, then bit again, tearing into the heart like a savage beast, blood smeared his mouth and his hands as he ate, oblivious to the dripping blood that fell to the floor as he stood there, stuffing the last of it into his mouth. It tasted so good, it was like a high that left him craving more and more...
Then he thought of that thing inside his head, gorging itself on whatever made its feeding possible after he ate the flesh of his own kind. He was feeding it, growing it, and it was using him...
Jinx fell to his knees, rammed two fingers down his throat and gagged, then gagged again and puked up the chewed pieces of heart in a bloody mess on the floor. Then he gagged hard, got up and leant heavily against the sink, turning on the tap and washing his face, his hands, spitting out the taste and grabbing mouthfuls of water from the flow to wash away the flavour. He left the water running as he leant on the sink again, breathless with his guts churning.
The craving, along with the crazy thoughts, were retreating...
"Fuck you," he said in a low voice, thinking on the parasite inside his head, "I know your game now...I feed and you make me insane...It stops now...It's my body, you're not having it!"
