“For spirit’s sake! Stop joking!” Her eyes filled with tears. “We have to get you more medication. Screw the rest of them. I’m taking this vessel to a hospital.”
“No!” I grabbed her. The movement sent shockwaves through the joints in my fingers, which were trying to cramp up again. “Don’t you dare jeopardize this crew.”
“I don’t care about them!” Every word was sharp. “I care about you. I’m not letting their crusade to save Marre kill my own sister.”
“Why should they feel differently than you?” I said, releasing her with a shove, probably a little too roughly. “Letting my well-being take precedence over everyone else would be the same thing. Besides, I don’t see why you care so much when you lied to me. You could have helped me ages ago. You could’ve helped our aunt.”
“Alana, listen to me. I didn’t lie; I couldn’t have helped you.”
“Concealing information with the intent to deceive is the same thing.”
I could tell she was trying to stay calm. “The only time I disclose my ability to relieve pain is when I’m helping a terminally ill client. What happened on Spin was a last resort; they would have arrested you otherwise. And you saw what happens when we manipulate the body! I can take away the pain, but it removes all capacity to function along with it. I don’t agree with handing that out to just anyone.”
“I’m your sister! Lai is your aunt. We’re family.”
This time, she was the one who grabbed me and held on. “Yes, Alana. You’re family. That’s more than enough reason not to do it. I care too much about your humanity. I may not get all this engineering stuff but I know you look like the person you were meant to be when you’re helping ships fly.”
Her words stunned me. I felt like I was listening to a different version of my sister. “Where is this coming from? You always hated my work.”
“I don’t get you, and sometimes you embarrass me, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want you to be happy. How fulfilled would you be if you were pain-free but mindless, incapable of working? I can’t take away your functionality; don’t believe in doing that to people. Most guides don’t, as a matter of fact, which is why the SAG keeps those abilities quiet and advises us to do the same. I especially won’t do that to my own sister. I didn’t tell you I could take away your physical suffering because I knew it would break your heart if you understood what the tradeoff would be. It’s a horrible choice to have to make, Alana. Physical suffering and the ability to pursue your passion, or relief and mental chaos.”
“But shouldn’t that be my choice to make? You just made it for me by keeping it from me.”
“What do you want me to do? Be sorry for not giving you the option of destroying what’s left of your life? Well, I’m not sorry. You have the right to make choices for yourself, but so do I. I have the right to decide what I’m willing to do with my skills as a guide, and I’m not willing to do that to you.”
My head hurt. I could barely think straight, let alone integrate all this new information about Nova and her abilities. I dug my knuckles into the back of my neck, trying to relieve some of the tension.
“You need your medication,” she said again. “I’ll make them get it to you if I have to.”
“We don’t have to raze the whole system just to get my prescription filled. I have something that gives me more time.”
“This?” She reached into her own pocket and pulled out my Panacea sample.
“Give me that.” I reached for it, and she put up no resistance when I snatched it away, crunching the wrapper. The small purple capsule looked more enticing than ever. At this point, dependency on the drug was the least of my concerns. “Doctor Shrike gave this to me. It can help me last until we get to the breach.”
“Alana. You heard what I said about the othersiders’ technology.”
“Yeah, you said we have to blow a hole into the side of the Tangled Axon.”
“You know that’s not what I’m talking about here.”
Her words echoed inside me: They don’t use technology. It’s just energy. They’re like spirit guides.
She gestured at the Panacea sample in my hand. “Their technology is a lie.”
“But this is medication—”
“It’s not going to do anything more than what I did to you on Spin. I sensed that pill the minute I set foot on the Tangled Axon. I know exactly what it is, because we use something similar to help us become accustomed to energy manipulation during guide training, and to help us understand what it’s like for our clients who want to experience temporary transcendence, like you did on Spin. It’s very much what it’s like to be led on a mystic journey. That pill is a contained unit of intention. Guide work. Very advanced work beyond anything I’ve seen on our side of the breach, but the result is basically the same.”
“I don’t understand . . . ” I looked at the pill. This wasn’t possible. I felt as if I’d been walking on a glass surface that had just broken beneath my feet, and I was falling. If this sample wasn’t real medicine, neither was the treatment I’d been saving for. Transliminal wouldn’t be able to help me or Lai. Nothing could.
“That pill isn’t science, Alana. I knew it as soon as I sensed it in your pocket. That’s why they refuse to talk about their technology. It’s all an illusion.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose, trying to push back the white spots. “That doesn’t make sense. Transliminal prescribes medication all the time—”
“That so-called medication just warps your reality like I did, Alana. It shuts down the ego, alleviates pain, and stimulates serotonin production so that you don’t notice you’re suffering anymore. It doesn’t cure anyone; it just makes illness and trauma more tolerable. If you’d taken the treatment—that one or anything else from Transliminal—you’d just wither away from Mel’s Disorder without noticing.”
My breathing became shallow. Denial crept up on me. What she was saying couldn’t be true. “Then why don’t we hear about it?” I said, grasping desperately at the lie I’d believed could save me.
“Don’t you remember how you felt on Spin? Why would we hear about their lies if the end result is bliss? Why would you ever complain? You wouldn’t even realize your illness had progressed until you lost consciousness. Why do you think I’ve refused contracts with anyone from our side of the breach who works for Transliminal Solutions? No one will prosecute them for their fraud because they don’t want to lose the mindless joy Transliminal can provide. Not to mention they have some of our system’s most powerful lobbyists passing legislation that makes it almost impossible to report on their activities. Even the SAG was silenced a long time ago. Why do you think no guides have said anything? I’m risking a lot just by telling you, but I have to.”
“I don’t understand,” I said. “If the othersiders are like you . . . if they’re basically spirit guides, for lack of a better name, then why does Birke need you?”
“I have no idea.”
“Shit.” I rested my arm on my knee, and my forehead on my arm. The panic had receded, leaving my limbs weak and shaking. I’d lost so much already, and now I’d lost hope as well. There I sat, with my disease digging its fingers into my flesh. “They’re not going to be able to do anything to help me, are they?”
“We have to get your Dexitek filled. I’m taking you to a hospital.”
“No,” I said. “I’ll tell the captain. They’ll find a way to get my scrip.”
“Alana!” Ovie shouted. Tev leaned against the wall. “She’s asking for you.”
I looked at Nova hard. She just gestured and sighed. “Go. I’ll wait. But they’d better help you get your Dexitek, or I’m ending this and we’re getting you to a medical facility.”
“They’ll help.”
“We’ll see.”
I lingered for a moment longer, but she wouldn’t look at me. She tore a clean piece of her dress away and placed it over Bell’s face, then prayed.
I quickly crossed the cargo bay and knelt down
next to Tev, collecting her hand into both of mine. She smiled, and though I could tell it was hard for her to muster the expression, it was sweet.
“Alana,” she croaked. A thick bandage covered the left side of her neck, and blood had matted most of her hair.
“Does she need a transfusion?” I said to Slip as she returned to apply salve to a small wound on Ovie’s arm. He smiled a little at me, wincing as she worked.
“No,” Slip said. “I don’t think so. It bled a lot but the debris only grazed her. We don’t have the means to do a transfusion even if she needed one. She went into an acute stress reaction, but I think she’s okay. I have a burn treatment patch on her. I was more worried about cardiac issues after getting hit with the plasma weapon but so far, she’s doing well.”
“She’s also right here,” Tev said, quietly. “How is the ship?”
Before anyone could respond, Tev shifted her weight and started to get up. Slip, Ovie, and I made various sounds of protest while I put my hands on her shoulders to keep her in place.
“You’re staying here,” Slip said.
“Marre.” Tev winced as she tried to get comfortable against the metal bulkhead. “Report.”
The pilot’s young voice echoed through the hold. “We are currently fifty-six million kilometers away from Spin, in a geostationary orbit around Valen. No enforcers are currently detected.”
“Engineering report?”
“Our port thruster needs repair,” Marre said. “They used weapons I’ve never seen before. Maybe othersider tech. I’ve done what I can for now to stabilize our navigation system and we should be okay temporarily, but we need repairs to bring us back to full functionality. There’s some minor damage to the starboard hull that requires attention.”
“Good girl, Axon,” Tev whispered, closing her eyes and resting her head against the bulkhead.
More tremors and a new wave of sickness crashed into me without warning. I pressed my palms against the floor to steady myself. Referred pain throbbed across the back of my head and into my temples, radiating out to just above my eyes.
“Alana.” Tev did her best to relax and looked at me. “Are you okay? Your shoulder . . . ”
“I’m fine—” I stopped and glanced back at Nova, who had climbed up onto one of the crates and stared straight at me. She would know if I lied.
“Actually, Tev . . . Captain.” I reached into my pocket, where the empty Dexitek bottle was still safely tucked away, a false comfort. I withdrew it, took her hand, and gave it to her, wrapping her fingers around the pitiful plastic.
Her eyes flicked up to mine.
I bit my lip, not wanting to give her the litany of bad news that waited on my lips.
“I need help.” I paused. “I’m out of medication.”
She sighed. “I see.”
“I’m sorry, Captain. I tried to hold out as long as I could.”
“You should have said something sooner. What else?”
“What?”
“You looked at the ceiling when you said you’re out of medication. We’ll get you your pills one way or another, but there’s something you’re not telling me.”
I looked at Nova, then at Bell’s body, trying to figure out the best way to tell her that we’d have to inflict further damage on her ship by destroying the device. When I returned my attention to Tev, she was giving me a hard look, her will inviolable.
“What did Bell say to you before she died?”
“Captain, there aren’t many options—”
“I just got shot in the neck. I’m not in the mood for obtuse answers.”
Grabbing my locs and twisting them, I tossed them over my shoulder. I bit my lip, then sighed. “We have to detonate the device.”
Chapter Thirteen
With Ovie’s help, Slip had moved a protesting Tev away from the cargo bay and into the infirmary so I could get to work on the device. Ovie returned and stood at the top of the stairwell, supervising my work from a safe distance in the event that something went wrong. Marre remained on the bridge, maintaining an extra containment field around the cargo bay to prevent me and Nova from getting more intimately familiar with the Big Quiet than we were ready for. At least if we lost the cargo hold, we wouldn’t have to lose everything in it.
“I still don’t think you should be in here,” I said to Nova, whose crossed arms indicated my arguments were futile.
“Don’t you need to take the top of it off?” she said, waving a gold-wreathed hand in the general direction of the device, the blood on her clothes powerless to undermine her elegance. “Maybe you should worry about that instead of what I’m doing.”
“What’s gotten into you?” I crouched down and started unfastening the bolts holding the device’s top panel to the body.
“You.” She sat down in one smooth series of motions, folding her arms over her fabric-draped knees. “The fact that my baby sister isn’t taking care of herself.”
“Not now, Nova.”
“You asked.”
“My mistake.”
She clucked her tongue and complained some more, but I couldn’t listen to it. I knew better than she did my body was giving out on me. Staccato bursts of pain hammered at my temples while the muscles along my spine felt like twisted rope. Now wasn’t the time to think about it, or about the fact that I’d been placing all my bets on a treatment that wasn’t even real medicine.
I pulled the top panel off the device with a metallic scrape, then reached into the center of the glowing mass of strings and grabbed a nest of copper coils beneath it.
“Nova,” I said, interrupting her speech about the importance of a stable income for securing proper medical care. “Go.”
“What—”
“Ovie,” I called out over my shoulder, barely able to see him from this angle. “Take my sister. It’s time.”
She started to get up, but hesitated. “That fast? Just like that? What if it—”
“Just go. There’s time before it detonates. I’ll be right behind you.”
“Go straight to the infirmary,” she said. “I’ll be waiting for you there.”
“Fine!” My arm ached from holding the position. “Just go, Nova! This hurts!”
One more moment of hesitation, and then she clanged up the stairs to join Ovie, who escorted her away. Before he disappeared, he nodded to me.
I almost yanked out the nest of wires, but first reached into my pocket with my free hand, drew out the Panacea sample from Dr. Shrike, and dropped it into the device.
“So much for magical solutions.”
I tightened my fist around the wires, and with one quick, hard motion, I pulled, imagining I was breaking the leash the enforcers had on us.
Sparks flew from the center of the device. Bolts of electricity shot out and started destroying the remaining empty crates, searing the metal skin of the Tangled Axon. I shouted through her bone-shattering pain, feeling as if someone had thrown me into a meat grinder. The writhing mass of light grew twice, three times its original size, distorting the air around it like a heat shimmer as it rose above the object. Loud bangs and sizzles and crashes reverberated from the device, into the room, into me. The bigger the light grew, the more energy it released in bolts of power that split bulkheads. I didn’t have the heart to look at Tev’s room; it would be in the line of fire like everything else, burning like my body burned with the Axon’s pain. At least the two surviving plants were tucked safely in my quarters.
Hull plating warped in the growing heat. The smell of hot metal and scorched plastic stung my nose and eyes, blurring my vision. Already I was on my feet and running toward the stairs, skipping steps. One of the plasma arcs snaked out and struck the metal just behind me, warping the stairs in a flash. It felt like my left arm snapped in half. Metal groaned beneath me, dropped away. I shouted as I slipped with it, but held onto the railings with aching hands and lifted myself up to the next step, and the next, grunting with effort when my hips failed to cooperate. Hefting m
yself up onto the last step, I didn’t bother taking a last look.
Good thing, too. Just as I turned the corner and ran for the infirmary, an explosion rocked the Tangled Axon, slamming me into the nearest bulkhead.
My head felt filled with pulsars, each one repetitively beaming electromagnetic radiation through my brain, until finally, I passed out right there in the corridor.
Head trauma, second-degree burns, and one third-degree burn to the leg that was too close to the plasma burst that had finally destroyed the cargo bay stairwell. Oh, and relentless throbbing in my hands, legs, and back.
My whole reality had narrowed to these sensations until I felt like that’s all there was to life: pain and burns, and the chill of the regenerative goo that Slip applied to the burn sites every few hours. She also kept me supplied with intravenous anti-inflammatories and opioids that would help tide me over until we could get more Dexitek.
Mercifully, I spent most of the next few days unconscious.
When I woke up and felt half-lucid for the first time in half a week, it was to that weird plastic smell that permeated the infirmary. Not just plastic—charred plastic, like the cargo bay explosion was following me around the Tangled Axon just to make me feel bad.
Laughter, somewhere to my left. I turned my foggy head. It was Slip, laughing and patting Tev’s leg, sharing some private joke. I couldn’t make out their soft murmurs. I just saw Tev’s mouth moving, and I noticed how her nose crinkled when she laughed, looking at Slip. It was the first time I’d seen her so unencumbered. Her face was sweet and, despite her injury, her laugh came from a deep place in her belly that I’d not heard until now. Yearning swelled in me.
You’d think with some serious injuries and a disease nipping at my heels I’d have more pressing matters to worry about than unrequited affections, but then you’d be wrong. I ruminated on it like a teenager, chastising myself for falling for someone unavailable. Easier than thinking about everything Nova had said, anyway.
Ascension: A Tangled Axon Novel Page 20
