by G. R. Lyons
Gods, why? he thought, panting and squeezing his eyes shut. Miles away and I still can't escape it all.
Graeden slowly lowered to the ground, crossing his arms over his knees and resting his forehead down on them. It took every bit of concentration he could muster to get himself meditated back into a calmer state of mind.
Chapter 9
ONCE HIS thoughts were sufficiently clear, Graeden used the cramped confines of his room to finish his workout, repeating sit-ups, squats, and push-ups until his muscles gave out and he collapsed on the cold, hard floor.
Graeden lay there for a long while, panting and shaking, until he finally managed to push himself up and get into the shower. He rushed through it, grimacing at the chloronic odor of the water, and pulled on a pair of loose-fitting pants to rejoin his fellows.
“Hey, just in time,” Jase said. Graeden looked up and saw the table back in place, the three doctors still sitting around it with playing cards, and bowls of food in front of Jase and Quinn. Jase hooked a thumb toward the kitchen and said, “Our designated housewife is here.”
“Bit early to eat, isn't it?” Graeden asked.
Jase shrugged. “I guess we all forgot about the time change. And gods forbid we eat at any hour other than what the Elders specify.”
Graeden raised an eyebrow. “Zevic?”
“Yep,” Jase said with a nod. “He brought the woman. Outlined our schedules. Shame you missed it. We had great fun.”
Quinn and Leni snorted and shook their heads, shoving the cards aside.
Graeden took a seat and glanced over as a woman emerged from the kitchen carrying two more bowls. She wore the traditional off-white wrap that all Tanasian women wore, with a full skirt covering her from the waist down and the wrap tucked around it, forming another skirt layer before running diagonally across the torso from the right hip to the left shoulder, covering the breasts but leaving the arms and sides bare.
The woman looked toward Graeden and gave a yelp, averting her eyes as she drew back a step. Moving carefully, she shuffled to one side and placed a bowl before Leni, then hurriedly deposited the last bowl before Graeden and whirled away.
Jase raised an eyebrow and snorted a laugh. “You'd think she'd never seen a man's body before.”
Graeden frowned, looking at where the woman had disappeared back into the kitchen, and shook his head. “I don't think she has. Did you notice the men's uniforms? High collar and long sleeves?”
“Dude, seriously,” Leni joked, “go put on a shirt. You're scaring the women.”
“Yeah, and you're making us look bad,” Jase added with a laugh.
Graeden rolled his eyes and picked up a spoon, the others following suit.
“What…exactly…is this?” Jase asked, spooning up the grey mush and watching it plop back into his bowl.
Leni brought a spoonful toward his nose and sniffed, wrinkling his nose. “I have no idea.”
The four doctors looked at one another, shrugged, and took a bite. Graeden saw them all grimace and forcefully swallow.
Leni coughed, and Quinn eyed another spoonful suspiciously as he asked, “Are we sure this is even food?”
Graeden pushed around the mush in his bowl with his spoon. “It looks like corn and…Hmmm. I have no idea.” He took another bite, swallowed, and grimaced again. “Now I know why my grandfather tries any new food he can get his hands on.”
Jase dropped his spoon. “Don't tell me this is what we're getting for every meal.”
Graeden nodded. “I wouldn't be surprised.”
The doctors groaned and forced their way through the rest of the meal, then shoved the bowls aside and resumed their card game after the woman left for the night. Graeden watched them, the game they'd been in the midst of only designed for three players, and snatched up a piece of paper and a pen from the other side of the table without thinking about it.
“How did you get these past the guards?” Quinn asked, waving his hand and tossing down the ten of stars.
“Secret compartment in my bag,” Leni said, slapping down an ace of moons.
“You're an idiot,” Jase said, frowning at his cards and drawing one from the pile.
“Why?”
“Smuggled in cards but couldn't hide your pistol?”
Leni shrugged. “Pistol wouldn't fit there. It was designed for money, watches, stuff like that.”
“But at least we have cards,” Quinn joked. “Maybe we can throw them at the officers when they come shoot us for breaking the fifteen thousand laws we're bound to break just by walking down the street the wrong way.”
“Nobody's gonna shoot us,” Jase said, rolling his eyes, and looked across at Graeden. “Whatcha doin', Grae?”
“Hmmm, what?” Graeden asked, looking up.
Leni reached out and snatched up the piece of paper before Graeden could stop him.
“Damn, dude,” he said, tilting the paper to one side and the other as he scrutinized it. “Since when did you learn to draw?”
“Len–” Graeden started to complain, reaching out for the paper, but Leni passed it on to Jase and out of Graeden's reach.
“Holy shit, this is awesome,” Jase said, holding out the drawing and raising his eyebrows. “Quinn, check this out–”
“Jase–”
“Oooh, who's the girl?” Quinn asked, tilting his head as he looked at the drawing.
Graeden jumped up, snatched the paper out of Quinn's hand, and flipped it around, his breath catching in his throat as he realized what he'd drawn. He crumpled up the sheet and kicked his chair aside.
“Where you going?” Jase asked.
“Bed,” Graeden called over his shoulder, and headed off to his room.
As he shut the door, he heard Leni ask, “Dude, what is up with him lately?”
“Beats me,” Jase said.
“He was acting weird even before we left,” Quinn added.
“Are we gonna play or are we gonna gossip like a bunch of women?” Jase asked. “Come on. Cards.”
Graeden climbed into bed and pulled the thin sheet up to his shoulders, pressing the pillow down over his head to block out the noise coming through the thin walls. He squeezed his eyes shut and tried every mental trick he knew to get the haunting memories out of his mind.
* * *
IN THE dream, Graeden stood by a starglass Gate, everything else in darkness around him. Out of the shadows, he saw the flash of a knife, a spray of blood, and heard screams and cries that came ever closer. Graeden dove through the Gate and found himself in an equally dark space, but as he took a step, he saw several armed figures come toward him, guns aimed and ready to fire. Graeden passed back through the Gate and again saw blood, almost running right into the knife. He jumped back through, and felt the cold pressure of a gun pressed to his forehead.
Feeling trapped and torn between two nightmare worlds, Graeden screamed.
He lurched up in bed, panting and sweating, and tried to make sense of his surroundings. It took him several moments to recognize the narrow bed and the tiny room, and remember that, for the time being, he was all but trapped on one side of a real Gate in the real world.
Not that he was quite ready to go back and face what was on the other side, but knowing that a gun stood between him and that future eventuality only made it all worse. Someday, he was going to have to go back and start over—want to go back and start over—but if the Elders found a way to keep him there…
Graeden shook aside the thought and got up to dig a sweatshirt out of the closet, shivering at the sudden chill in the room. He peeked out the window and saw Garis still hadn't quite set in the distance, so he pulled on a pair of thick socks and went in search of more blankets.
There were no storage spaces in the room, so he looked under the bed and found nothing, nor did he find any cabinets in the washroom. Out in the hallway, there was nothing, either, nor did he find any storage in the kitchen beyond what little held dishes and food products.
He looked up
as he heard another set of footsteps come down the hallway.
“Mother's hell, is it always this cold here at night?” Jase asked, zipping up a jacket.
Graeden slammed shut the last cabinet he was checking and shook his head. “If you're going to blame the gods, I'm not sure it's the Mother's weather at fault here. Try the Lady instead. Gods know these people could use a healthy dose of truth.”
“No shit,” Jase muttered, shivering. “No fireplace, no thermostat–”
“No blankets,” Graeden added.
“Gods be damned,” Leni muttered, coming out to join them with Quinn not far behind. “Did we somehow end up on Falsin in the middle of the night?”
Quinn held up a finger. “If we were on Falsin dressed like this, we'd probably be dead.”
Leni rolled his eyes. “Thank you, Captain Literal. I just meant–”
A siren sounded outside, and the doctors ran for the door, scrambling out to the street. They looked around, waiting for others to come out of their homes, waiting to hear screams or panic or some other sort of response to the noise, but nothing happened.
“What in the gods' names…” Jase began.
“False alarm, you think?” Leni asked. “What was that?”
“Who knows,” Quinn muttered.
They looked around again, the streets dark and quiet, and slowly went back inside, glancing over their shoulders as they went, but still saw no other response.
“So, that was weird,” Jase said.
“This whole gods-damned place is weird,” Leni spat, rubbing his arms. “What do you think we–”
“Aaaaah!”
Graeden grabbed his head and dropped to his knees, feeling an odd pressure behind his eyes and hearing the hiss of what sounded like several voices speaking at once.
“Grae?”
“Dude, you alright?”
“What's wrong?”
Graeden squeezed his eyes shut and clamped his hands down over his ears, breathing heavily as he tried to calm his mind. He felt someone grab his shoulder, but he couldn't look to see who until he finally got his meditation under control and the pressure slowly faded away.
“Grae?”
He lowered his hands and saw Jase staring intently at him.
“I'm alright, I think.”
“What in seven hells was that?”
Graeden shook his head. “I have no idea. It's still there, but…Gods, I don't know. It's like a dozen people just jumped inside my head. Fuck, that hurt.”
Jase sat back on his heels and raised an eyebrow at him. “Grae–”
“Don't even start, Jase,” Graeden said, bracing himself against the counter as he stood, Jase joining him a moment later. “I'm perfectly sane.”
Jase shook his head. “That's not what I was going to say.” He paused, glancing around the room, and lowered his voice. “Have you ever considered the possibility that you have the same mental abilities these people do?”
“That's ridiculous,” Graeden scoffed, shaking his head. “I–”
He cut off as his meditated calm slipped, and the pressure came back, the voice-like sound growing more clear as he heard in his mind, “–give our children the strength to survive. To her we pledge our undying faith. Praise to Inaria, Lady of Purity, the blind goddess of truth. May she show us the righteous path, and turn us from the sinful temptation of individual choice. To her we pledge–”
Graeden blinked and rubbed his temples, taking a deep breath as he forced the intrusion aside.
“They're praying,” he murmured.
“What?”
Graeden took another deep breath and said, “They're praying. All at once. Everyone. Gods, I can hear them all.” He stopped and looked at Jase. “All these voices in my head–” It started to take over again, so he squeezed his eyes shut and covered his ears, waiting until he managed to force the pressure away. “Fucking hells.”
He opened his eyes and saw the others looking at him strangely.
“What?”
“Grae,” Jase began slowly, “did your grandfather ever teach you how to control this?”
Graeden shook his head. “This has never happened before. We never even discussed it.”
“You do realize you're going to have to be very, very careful now,” Jase said, “because if this stuff is getting in…”
“Thoughts might also be getting out,” Graeden finished for him.
“No, dude, this is cool!” Leni said, slapping Graeden on the arm. “Maybe we can use this, if you can learn to control it.”
Graeden narrowed his eyes. “I'm not exactly eager to be getting inside these people's heads, Len.”
Leni shrugged. “Could be useful.”
“Yeah, well, in the meantime,” Jase cut in, “this could be a huge problem.”
Graeden grabbed his head again and winced.
“I'm going back to bed,” he muttered, and pushed past his friends to return to his room.
He shut the door, climbed into bed, and clamped a pillow around his ears, but it couldn't block out the inaudible assault. Graeden took a deep breath and focused on emptying his mind, pushing against the voices until he felt himself again.
Chapter 10
AFTER AN unsatisfying breakfast that was more or less a repeat of what they'd had for dinner the night before, Graeden and the others walked to the hospital and were greeted by Zevic's bureaucratic smile.
“Found your way alright, I see,” Zevic said, and turned to lead the way through the maze of hospital corridors to the room they'd seen the day before.
The doctors set their medical kits on the counter and turned to see four more beds occupied that morning. There were also, as promised, eight extra nurses present, standing off to one side of the room and looking completely useless next to so many empty beds.
“Well, I shall leave you to your work for a short while,” Zevic announced. “I have a few patient reports to investigate, but I'll be back to see how you're coming along.”
As soon as he was gone, Graeden joined his fellows in a sigh of relief.
“So, Dr. Keisen,” Jase called out, “mind if we have a look?”
The Tanasian doctor shrugged and held out his hands, gesturing at the patients and stepping aside. Graeden and the others pulled on gloves and surrounded the first patient, checking his vitals and asking about his diet and symptoms, making a fresh sheet of notes in the patient's file without consulting what was already there, wanting a fresh, unbiased start.
They moved on to the next patient, and then the next, repeating the same questions as they went.
“What is your diet like?”
“Corn, mostly,” the patient answered, same as the others. “We have a lot of it, so that's what the Elders give us to eat.”
“And your symptoms?”
“I don't sleep well, and I get confused easily. My digestion is…not great, if you take my meaning. I drop things a lot.”
Graeden took hold of the man's arm and examined his skin.
“Dermatitis,” he muttered, and saw Jase nod agreement. “Would you open your mouth for me?”
The patient complied, and Graeden flashed a light into his mouth.
Graeden sighed and rolled his eyes. “These people have pellagra. They're not sick. It's just a diet issue.”
“What was that?” Dr. Keisen asked.
“Diarrhea, dermatitis, tongue inflammation, insomnia, weakness,” Graeden rattled off. “Classic symptoms of pellagra, easily caused by a corn-based diet. If these people had more variety in their food—fish, eggs, dates, nuts, things like that—they'd probably be just fine.”
“So, what do we do?” the Tanasian doctor asked, looking puzzled as he glanced at the patients.
Graeden paused for a moment before he said, “Feed them properly.”
“But what about him?” Keisen asked, pointing at the first patient, the one who'd been there from the day before.
Graeden glanced over at the patient and asked, “Do you have any nicotin
amide?” The doctor frowned and shook his head questioningly. “Niacin? Vitamin B3? Any of these sound familiar?”
Dr. Keisen shook his head again, and Graeden threw his hands up. He strode over to his medical kit and dug through it, looking to see if he had anything that might help.
Jase stopped beside him and did the same, giving him a sympathetic look.
“This is going to be a very long trip,” Graeden muttered under his breath, and Jase nodded agreement.
In his peripheral vision, Graeden saw Zevic walk into the room, followed by a woman carrying a stack of files, her head bowed. Graeden kept his eyes on his bag as he continued to search, not wanting to deal with their bureaucratic guide at that moment.
“So, how are we doing?” Zevic asked, stopping in their midst.
“I'll handle this,” Jase whispered, and turned to face the director. “We have some suspicions, but there's still a lot of investigation we can do, especially if there are more patients.”
“Well, there are certainly plenty more,” Zevic said. “They come and go as they can. You'll definitely have your hands full. Show me what you have so far.”
Graeden took a deep breath and sighed, closing up his kit and turning to watch the certain farce that would develop as the Agori doctors tried to explain their findings to a know-nothing bureaucrat. As he lifted his eyes, his gaze was drawn past Zevic to the woman on the other side of the room, carefully arranging files with her back to him. She tilted her head back as she scanned the labels on a rack attached to the wall, her long brown hair trailing past her waist, then tucked a file into one of the slots before turning to do the same on a rack beside her, giving Graeden a look at her profile.
Graeden yelped and jumped back, knocking over a rickety cart. Jase helped him as he scrambled to his feet and backed away even more.
“Good gods, Grae,” Jase said with a laugh. “You look like you've seen a ghost!”
Panting, Graeden stared at the woman, and saw Zevic look from him to her and back.
“Her?” Zevic asked. “That's just Zhadeyn. Hardly a ghost. Zhadeyn!”
