Strange Cosmology

by Alex Raizman

  Crystal stumbled behind a car, heart pounding. Her mind worked a mile a minute, with the kind of clarity that only came when you were at imminent risk of death. It was unlikely that some random person had ichor rounds. That meant those damn super-soldiers Ryan had talked about were here. Which meant Ryan was in danger, possibly even dead, from the precise threat Crystal had said wouldn’t be a problem.

  No, Crystal, don’t focus on that. You have to save yourself, then you can save him.

  The first thing she had to deal with was the wound in her shoulder. Gritting her teeth, she reached into the open wound and began to hunt for the bullet. It was an agonizing process, but after a few seconds, she felt it between her fingers. She inhaled deeply, exhaled, and pulled.

  Okay, she told herself. Okay. That was bad, but you’re fine now, love. You’re fine. You’re good.

  The ichor erupting from the wound told a different story. Crystal was starting to feel lightheaded, and the last thing she needed was more pain, but the only way to stop the bleeding was going to involve a lot of pain.

  Resolved, she put her hand over her bleeding shoulder and turned up the heat. Her already faint vision went dark for a moment from the sheer torment, but she didn’t lose consciousness, and she kept the phasing effect up. By the time her shoulder was cauterized, she was weeping silently and breathing in hitching gasps.

  C’ mon, love, push through it.

  Gunfire punched holes in the car, then traced its way down the street. The shooter clearly wasn’t sure where she had gone, so they were firing in the blind hope of hitting her. If they kept it up long enough, they’d be able to pull it off.

  Right now, all Crystal could do was hold her ground. She pressed her hand against the side of the car and twisted atomic numbers. Cheap aluminum turned into carbon, and she rearranged the molecules to form a solid barrier of graphene between herself and the shooter.

  The effort made her drop the phase. She was fully vulnerable now, but her barrier should protect from the ichor rounds. She leaned against the car and took several deep breaths in rapid succession, then moved her injured shoulder. The agony was immense, but it moved. Small favors. She could still use the arm. Barely.

  The gunfire stopped, and Crystal forced herself to wait. They’ll want to check the area. And when they do...I can get moving again.

  The waiting paid off. After a couple of minutes, a pair of soldiers walked to the place where she’d been shot. One of them crouched down to look at the splatters of ichor. Gritting her teeth, Crystal dropped a field of invisibility over herself and one of the soldiers and then bent light to plunge them both into darkness.

  The man screamed and flailed about blindly, but Crystal could still navigate by the equations she saw. Even with only one good arm, it was easy to pull the rifle from his grip and smash the butt against his nose. She wielded the weapon like a baseball bat, hitting him in the face and arms until he collapsed.

  Crystal kicked him out of the range of her invisibility and dropped the darkness so she could observe.

  “Oh…shit.” The remaining soldier whispered, moving to stand over his fallen friend. “I have hostile contact out here!” He shouted into the radio. “Repeat, I have hostile contact!”

  From the radio, a voice responded, “Copy that. Where’s the damn target?”

  That must be the sniper that shot me in the first place, Crystal thought, waiting for the right moment. The soldier replied, “Target is invisible! Repeat, the target is-“

  Crystal shifted the invisibility field over the remaining soldier and gave him the same treatment she’d just given his companion. A bullet buzzed through the field, but Crystal was already moving.

  “Respond! Anyone there?” The radio squawked, and Crystal took a grim satisfaction at the panic in the speaker’s voice. “I need support! Omega is on-site! Repeat, Omega is on-site!”

  Crystal didn’t wait to hear anything else. She ran towards Isabel’s building, dropping her invisibility once she hit the lobby. The directory gave her Isabel’s apartment number - eleven stories up.

  She hit the stairs hard and began vaulting up them as fast as she could, taking them three or four at a time. Each step sent a fresh jolt of agony through her shoulder. She was seeing black spots by the fifth floor and was barely standing by the eleventh.

  As she staggered out of the stairwell, she heard helicopters in the distance. She groaned and pushed herself down the hall. Not yet…not yet. Need a bit more time. Just a few more seconds.

  There was a bloody path leading from an open door to the elevator. Crystal stared down at it, trying to make sense of what she was seeing. Who had been hurt? Ryan? His sister? Someone else? The blood trail looked like someone had been dragged.

  A bullet tugged Crystal’s hair as it missed her by inches. She jerked her head up to see a woman standing in the doorway with a revolver.

  “Will everyone please stop shooting me?!” Crystal shouted.

  The woman dropped the revolver in shock. “Oh my god, you’re not military!” Isabel screamed. “Oh Jesus, oh God, please tell me I missed.”

  Crystal couldn’t help it. She started laughing at the absurdity of almost being shot by the woman she was trying to rescue. “No, love, I’m not the sodding military,” she choked out, “and you did miss. I’m Crystal.”

  “Right, Crystal. Sorry. Oh God. Please, save him!” Isabel’s eyes were wide, and tears were streaming down her face. She looked like she was holding onto sanity by a fishing line that could snap at any moment.

  Those three words slapped the laughter out of Crystal. “Save him? What happened?”

  “He got…shot. In the…his face. His face got shot off. I got him in the bathtub but he’s not breathing but you all don’t need to breathe so I don’t know what-“

  Crystal brushed past Isabel and went through the apartment to the bathroom. Ryan’s body lay there, and Isabel hadn’t been exaggerating. With his cheeks blown out and his mouth hanging open, he looked like a corpse.

  Ryan, no no no...Taking a deep breath to steady herself for the worst, Crystal reached down to his pocket and felt his nanoverse.

  It was still solid, not the crumbling sand that would have indicated a dead Nascent.

  “He’s alive, but barely.” She turned to Isabel, her face hard. “Isabel. I need you to do exactly what I say, follow my every cue. We can get out of this alive, and I can save him. Maybe. But only if you do everything I say, without hesitation. Can you do that?”

  Isabel nodded rapidly, tears still pouring out of her eyes. “His face...oh God his face.”

  Crystal stepped forward and grabbed the other woman by the arm, forcing Isabel to look her directly in the eyes. “Isabel. Listen to me. I am a million years old. I’ve been waiting a million years for your brother. Do you believe, for a single goddamn second, that I’m going to let him die?”

  Isabel shook her head.

  “Good. Now. You still listening? Your brother is a god. He can heal from anything, so long as he doesn’t actually die. His wounds are bad, but he won’t bleed out. That means that if we get him out of here, he is going to live, and so you are. But the only way that happens is if you focus and follow directions, okay?”

  This time, when Isabel nodded, Crystal could see a small thread of rationality behind her eyes. She’d hold up, long enough.

  “Good. Get me a glass of water and something I can eat. Now.”

  True to her word, Isabel ran off without hesitation. Crystal took a few moments to tear down the shower curtain and begin fastening a sling to carry Ryan. Can’t just toss him over my shoulder, need my hands free.

  Isabel returned as Crystal was finishing. She didn’t speak, just thrust a bottle of water and a protein bar in Crystal’s face. Without a word, Crystal grabbed both and downed them as quickly as she could. The helicopter sound was getting louder.

  “They’ll do. That’s two.” Crystal furrowed her brow. “Still not enough. I need a bit more. Still Hungry. Don’t have time for
a nap.”

  Isabel stared at her with wild eyes. “Hunger? Right, what can I do?”

  Crystal’s mind raced. Once the helicopters opened fire, they were done for. She didn’t think she could hold off a missile right now. Thinking frantically, she squeezed her nanoverse for a bit more strength.

  “Remember, love,” she told Isabel. “Everything I say. No hesitation.”

  The helicopter was almost there, and Crystal just wasn’t strong enough to deal with it. Her Hungers were clamoring for attention. Even with the food and drink, she needed a nap, and she needed some human interaction. The first one was out of the question, and for the second…

  Oh, duh, Crystal. She turned to Isabel. “I need you to kiss me.”

  Isabel gave her a confused look. Crystal believed Isabel had been sincere in her intent to follow everything Crystal had said without question but hadn’t anticipated one of those requests being so incongruous. “I’m sorry, what?”

  “I can explain later, love. But the helicopter will be able to start firing in under a minute, and I’m too weak to save us, but if-” Crystal’s explanation was cut short as Isabel grabbed her and pulled Crystal’s face to her own. They locked lips and embraced. For a handful of seconds, nothing else mattered but that kiss, drowning out the fear and pain and tiredness and sound of approaching aerial annihilation. Instead, there was an electrical surge flowing between them, one of the purest and most potent ways two people can connect.

  Before they got too wrapped up in it and got blown to pieces, Crystal broke the kiss and smiled. “Okay, yeah. We’re good.”

  Isabel blinked a few times. The human contact seemed to have helped her get a better grip on reality for the moment...or maybe everything was so crazy that Isabel was just kind of floating along with the madness. “The Hungers, right?”

  “Doesn’t matter.” Crystal said. “That was wonderful, love, really. So now I need to grab your brother-” She bent down in a fluid motion and put the shower curtain sling over her good shoulder, leaving Ryan hanging across her back like a huge bloody purse. Literally bloody. Isabel turned to the sink and threw up.

  “-and now I need to save us both. Take my hand.” Crystal used her good arm for a quick twist to reinforce the curtain and stick it to her body. That should prevent Ryan from coming loose. Should.

  After the kiss, it didn’t seem anything Crystal suggested would seem odd. Isabel grabbed the hand on her bad arm, and Crystal fought to keep the pain off her face.

  “What…what are we doing?” Isabel asked.

  Crystal turned to face her, the smile growing even wider. “Something incredibly, insanely stupid.”

  “What-” Isabel began to ask, but Crystal was already running, pulling Isabel along into the living room. The helicopter was coming into view; they literally had waited until the last second.

  As they ran, Crystal gestured. Isabel’s sliding door exploded outwards, sending a hail of supersonic glass flying towards the helicopter. The helicopter launched a missile at that exact moment, and the force Crystal had used to break the door hit the rocket. It detonated halfway between the helicopter and the apartment.

  To Isabel’s credit, she didn’t stop running when the helicopter exploded. She did start screaming, however, the kind of scream that didn’t stop. Crystal gestured again, hitting the head of a second missile with a twisted equation.

  She slapped a negative sign on its acceleration, thinking through the process. Negative acceleration isn’t a real thing. It’s just the opposite direction from its current path. Which means the front of the missile is going to meet the back of the missile right about -

  The missile flattened into a pancake and violently exploded.

  The helicopter pilot wasn’t an idiot. He didn’t waste another rocket on them. He instead switched over to the minigun slung under the helicopter’s belly. Crystal’s heart sunk as she heard the whirring sound of the gun warming up.

  Crystal and Isabel were almost on the balcony, Isabel now screaming actual words. “Crystal we’re on the eleventh floo-ohmygod!”

  As a hail of bullets flew toward them, Crystal threw out her hand and sent the railing of Isabel’s balcony ripping free of its moorings at Mach six. She and Isabel followed, although at a much slower speed.

  The helicopter pilot was likely ready for most things. Crystal figured there’s no way they’d let an amateur fly on this kind of mission. However, nothing in his training could have prepared him for a hypersonic balcony railing.

  The two objects collided in midair, and the impact sent the helicopter spinning away. Two other helicopters were moving into position, but gravity had a firm grip on Crystal and Isabel at this point, carrying them towards the ground.

  Isabel resumed her wordless screaming as Crystal whipped them around so she could face upwards. The effort of holding on to Isabel’s hand was pure agony at this point, but if they were connected, that was one less twist Crystal needed. With a quick gesture, she sent shards from the balcony flying at the other two helicopters. Both of the vehicles were met with a hail of shrapnel that was alive and spiteful. One began to spin out of control. Crystal dealt with the remaining helicopter by twisting gravity. Suddenly, everything near the remaining helicopter regarded it as “down”.

  Loose objects from the building’s roof, the shrapnel of the crashing vehicles, and the two remaining helicopters all slammed into the last adversary, turning the entire mass into a giant fireball as fuel tanks ignited.

  Crystal twisted gravity around herself, Isabel, and Ryan. The new, weaker gravity carried them safely to the ground as Crystal reached up and did one final twist, encasing the three of them in a protective shield of air as debris rained around them.

  Isabel looked up at Crystal, her eyes full with a mixture of shock, terror, exhilaration, and awe. “Oh my God,” she said, her voice hoarse.

  “Goddess,” Crystal corrected. “Come on. We still have to finish saving your brother.”

  Chapter 13

  Recoup and Regroup

  Crystal slammed her doorway shut behind Isabel. She didn’t waste any time calling up a bed for Ryan. The shower curtain she’d used for an impromptu sling was slick with blood, and Ryan’s breathing was coming in short, shallow gasps.

  “Oh my God,” Isabel gasped, getting her first good look at her brother since the initial attack. Crystal didn’t blame her. She’d seen some severe injuries in her day, but this was a fresh horror. Isabel started to gag, and Crystal summoned up a bucket.

  “Whole thing finally hit your limit, love?” Crystal said absentmindedly, already forming a variety of tools to begin work on Ryan’s face.

  “Yes. How – I mean, is he…” Isabel didn’t seem to be able to finish a sentence. Again, Crystal couldn’t blame her.

  “He’s alive, and he’ll be all right. I think.” Crystal looked over her shoulder and gave Isabel her most reassuring smile.

  It didn’t seem to work particularly well. Isabel was pale and shaking slightly.

  She wiped her mouth before asking, “You think? Sorry, I don’t mean to sound…ungrateful, it’s just …shouldn’t we get him to a doctor?”

  “I just jumped off a building and took out three helicopters before I hit the ground, and you think I can’t doctor?”

  “What? How are those even remotely connected?” Isabel gave Crystal a wide-eyed stare.

  “Damn, was hoping you wouldn’t think of that,” Crystal said lightly, turning back to Ryan. “Yes, they are different skills. But Ryan’s past a doctor’s ability to help at this point, mainly because a doctor will be working based on normal human biology, yeah?”

  Isabel nodded in agreement, which was a relief because that was a complete fabrication. The truth was that if they took him to a hospital, those government super-soldiers will be all over them before they could sign the paperwork.

  Crystal continued, “As long as I can get Ryan to stop bleeding, it’ll be fine. He’ll have some nasty scars that he’ll probably want to shapeshift
away, but that’s it.” Crystal began to thread a needle. “I’ve done post-battle surgery on gods before, so this is an old trick.”

  Isabel nodded slowly, then said, “Wait. If he can shapeshift the scars away, can’t we just wake him up so he can shift himself healthy?”

  Crystal shook her head. “Doesn’t work that way. You can’t shift away damage. He could turn into a dog right now if he was awake, and he had actually learned to shapeshift into an animal, but it would be a dog with a missing nose and holes in the cheeks.”

  As Crystal began to stitch. Isabel turned around and made another retching noise again, although it just sounded like a heave.

  Isabel kept her back turned. “But…well, why? Why can’t you just…fix it?”

  Crystal chuckled but didn’t pause in her stitching. “You and Ryan are definitely related. Love, you’re standing in a pocket universe between my nanoverse and reality, your entire life just got turned upside down, your apartment is being raided by the government, and you’re worried about the minutiae of divine shapeshifting.” Although the words were mocking, her tone was kind, almost sympathetic. “Trust me, love. It’s better if you just roll with it.”